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7 



A Contribution to the Comparatiye 

Study of the Medieval Visions of 

Heaven and Hell, with Special 

Reference to the Middle- 

Eiiglish Versions. 



A DISSERTATION 

PRESENTED TO THE BOARD OF UNIVERSITY STUDIES OF 

THE JOHNS HOPKINS UNIVERSITY FOR THE 

DEGREE OF DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY 



BY 



ERNEST J, BECKER 



BALTIMORE : 

JOHN MURPHY COMPANY 

1899. 






4^ 



QP 



^^ 



440 9ii 





CONTENTS. 



Page. 
Introduction, 1 

I. Sources and General Development of the Visions, - - 9 

1. Oriental Analogues, ---------9 

2. Influence of Classical Antiquity, 20 

3. The Old Testament, 21 

4. The Book of Enoch, 22 

5. The New Testament, 25 

6. The Gospel of Nicodemus, 26 

7. The Vision of Thespesius, --------27 

8. The Apocalypse of Peter, --- 29 

II. The Visions in Anglo-Saxon Literature, - - - - 49 

1. Visions Recounted by Bede, 49 

2. The Anglo-Saxon Hell, 54 

(a) The Poets, 54 

(6) The Homilists, 64 

3. The Anglo-Saxon Purgatory, -69 

III. The Middle-English Visions, 74 

1. The Vision of St. Paul, 74 

2. The Vision of Tundale, 81 

3. St. Patrick's Purgatory, 87 

4. The Vision of the Monk of Eynsham, 93 

5. TheVisionof Thurcill, 96 



, 



A CONTRIBUTION TO THE COMPARATIVE STUDY 
OF THE MEDIEVAL VISIONS OF HEAVEN AND 
HELL, WITH SPECIAL REFERENCE TO THE 
MIDDLE-ENGLISH VERSIONS. 



Introduction. 



The present study represents the result of an attempt to com- 
pare more closely than has hitherto been done the English 
medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell. The original plan was 
to specialize on one particular work (the Vision of St. Paul), and 
using it as a point of departure, to bring the other similar works 
into organic connection with it and with one another. Almost 
inevitably, however, the field for investigation grew broader and 
broader as the work went on ; new and important points of con- 
tact constantly presented themselves, and it very soon became 
evident that the study, in order to attain even a partial degree 
of completeness, could not be confined within the boundaries of 
England. In order to trace the incidents of the English visions 
back to their ultimate sources, it became imperative to consider 
carefully certain intermediate continental works in connection 
with them ; and from these it was but a short step to the earlier 
and more primitive works which constitute the foundation of 
medieval vision-literature. 

No systematic comparative study of the visions, with a view 
to tracing their oldest elements to their sources, has yet been 
attempted. Such an undertaking, necessitating as it would a 
careful analysis of the forms which the doctrine of an after-life 
assumed among the various peoples, and a painstaking collation 
of the many elements thus obtained, would severely tax the 
powers of any single investigator. As Schermann puts it : 
''Diese Nachforschungen diirfen sich nicht damit begniigen die 

1 



2 The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell. 

einschlagigen Produkte eines der grossen Sprachstamme, wie etwa 
des indogermanischen, in den Kreis der Untersuchung zu ziehen. 
Dies verbietet sich schon durch die Natur der in Betracht kom- 
menden litterarischen Werke, dann aber vornehmlich audi durch 
die Erwagung, dass die Mogliolikeit einer um jene Schranken 
unbekiimmerten Entlehnung nirgend so nahe liegt, als da, wo es 
sich um elementare religiose Begriffe und ihre Weiterbildung 
haudelt."^ It seems evident, therefore, that the only means by 
which a complete and satisfactory final result can possibly be 
obtained is through a large number of special studies tending to 
the same end. It is with this object in view that the present 
slight contribution, in specializing on the rise and development 
of the visions on English soil, is offered. 

Aside from England, two stages in the general development 
of visions have been taken up in some detail in the following 
pages : Oriental influence, and the Apocalypse of Peter. Such a 
procedure hardly requires an apology. Many of the analogies 
between the visions and the oriental conceptions of the otherworld 
have been previously pointed out. But the data are widely 
scattered, and it seemed well to gather them, together with a few 
hitherto unnoticed points of similarity, into a connected account. 
Whereas the Apocalypse of Peter, being the earliest Christian 
vision — in our sense of the word — which we possess, seemed the 
best possible point from which to indicate the organic manner in 
which all the visions are connected. 

The intermediate stages between these two cardinal points 
in vision-development are, 1. Classical antiquity; 2. The Old 
Testament ; 3. Old Testament Apocrypha, especially the Book 
of Enoch; 4. The Canonical New Testament; 5. New Testa- 
ment Apocrypha, especially the Gospel of Nicodemus. For the 
sake of completeness, these points will be briefly treated in the 
following pages. 

Within Christian times, the works of the church fathers were 
of course chiefly instrumental in diffusing the visions. Homilies, 
commentaries, theological essays, and ecclesiastical histories were 
alive with accounts, in vision form, of the terrors of hell and 
of purgatory. These accounts were spread among the people by 

^Materialien zur Geschichie d. Indischen Visionslitieraiur. Leipzig, 1892, p. 3 f. 



The Medieval Visions of Heaven and HelL 3 

popular preachers and homilists, and in this way the visions no 
doubt became largely responsible for the epidemics of terror which 
pervaded the Middle Ages. 

Thus we have the skeleton of vision-development established. 
Deriving the general form and many of the details from the 
East, the earliest Christian vision-writers grafted them upon such 
slight material as they found in the Old and New Testaments and 
their apocrypha, and attaching the names of Christian saints and 
martyrs to the results, launched them as inspired revelations. 
Barren in detail and crude in execution at first, they lived on 
in the minds of the people for several centuries without material 
alteration or embellishment. The church fathers made use of 
them to support their doctrines, and were chiefly instrumental 
in giving them the great vogue which they afterwards attained. 
Gregory the Great adduced them in support of his doctrine of 
purgatory, just as they are still adduced for the support of the 
same doctrine at the present day.^ Through Gregory especially 
they passed into the work of local historians, such as Bede in 
England ; and were taken up and diifused among the people by 
homilists, such as Aelfric. And all the while the clergy was 
becoming ever more and more powerful, and the people ever 
more and more panic-stricken at the thought of what even the 
least sinful of them would have to undergo before obtaining 
everlasting bliss. And the more panic-stricken the people became, 
the greater swelled the power of the clergy, till at last the terror 
of the one became a nervous disease afflicting nations at a time, 
and the power of the other greater than the world had ever 
known. 

It was in such an unhealthy atmosphere that visions flourished 
in all their power. They are the outgrowth of a fundamentally 
morbid psychological condition. The clergy who wrote began 
to pour them out in countless numbers, and preachers thundered 
them down upon the heads of their terrified congregations with 
all the additional emphasis of voice and gesture ; and, finally, 
even laymen took them up and put them into verse, adding new 
horrors from their own fertile imaginations, and producing such 

^ Cf. for example, F. X. Schouppe, The Dogma of Purgatory, Illustrated from 
the Lives and Legends of the Saints. London, 1893. 



4 The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell. 

catalogues of elaborated torment as, for example, the Vision of 
Tandale. 

It would therefore not be inappropriate to speak of an " epi- 
demic of visions," and to include the phenomenon under the 
category of the many nervous diseases which afflicted the Middle 
Ages : the judgment-day panic, the children's crusades, and that 
most peculiar psychological phenomenon, especially prevalent in 
Italy, the epidemic of dancing.^ 

In the face of these evidences of the morbid mental and 
physical conditions of the Middle Ages, there can be no doubt 
that trances and syncopes, hallucinations, catalepsies, and the 
whole long catalogue of similar abnormalities, were widely opera- 
tive among the people. We have the evidence of the visions 
themselves for it, and the circumstances which attended at least 
the later visions are of just this character. A man to all outward 
appearances dies, and, after remaining in a condition of total 
unconsciousness for a stated time, suddenly comes to life again, 
and relates what he has seen during his trance. What is more 
natural than to suppose that the soul had, by a special dispensa- 
tion of providence, been separated from the body during that time ? 

From a pathological point of view, the circumstances are not 
at all surprising. It is quite natural that a person who has 
reduced his vitality to its lowest ebb by continual privation and 
exposure, and whose religious fanaticism borders upon lunacy, 
should be subject to periods of ecstacy; and that he should, upon 
returning to a comparatively normal state, imagine that he had 
actually seen things which for years he had constantly been 
picturing to himself in imagination. Nor would he experience 
the slightest difficulty in convincing his hearers of the truth of 
his statements, and thus the marvelous story would spread. 

The extent of the influence of the visions upon the mental life 
of the times must not be underrated. They were undoubtedly 
a powerful factor in establishing for religion the undisputed 
supremacy which it possessed over the minds of men in the 
Middle Ages. They formed, as could nothing else, a link between 
this world and the next, and seemed to solve in a way which 

^ Cf. Hecker-Hirsch, Volkskrankheiten d. Mittelalters, p. 124f. 



The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell. 5 

left no room for doubt the greatest questions which theology or 
philosophy could propound. 

The story of the torments of hell and of purgatory, and of the 
joys of heaven, found its liighest and practically its final literary 
expression in the Divina Commedia of Dante. The great chaotic 
mass of materials, much of it inherited from the East, but more 
sprung from the extraordinarily fertile imaginations of the medieval 
clergy, yielded readily to the touch of genius, and was sifted, 
remodelled, and moulded into a poetic whole by Dante's wonderful 
art. All prior efforts to create a poetic hell fade into obscurity 
when placed in the dazzling light of this great work ; but for 
the student of literary history these lesser productions are per- 
haps more valuable, since they portray more exactly the real 
mental life of the times. In Dante^s work, political rather than 
religious, and above all artistic, hell and its torments are but a 
vehicle for individual opinion, and not the all-important theme. 
Nevertheless the Divina Commedia, owing to its exalted literary 
position, and to the immense amount of critical analysis to which 
it has been submitted, has been the natural starting-point for 
investigations like the present. Dante-scholars were very slow 
to discover that their author had not invented his whole work, 
but had culled from an almost inexhaustible stock of materials. 
And even when they had discovered this, they were unwilling 
to believe it, or lacked the courage to pry more deeply into the 
unknown field. But scientific research will not be gainsaid, and 
during the course of the present century it has been conclusively 
shown that Dante merely appropriated the many legends of 
heaven and hell which were then universally known (especially 
those in the form of Visions), and choosing such of them 
as best suited his purpose, gave them definite and immortal 
expression. 

This admission does not in the least detract from the glory 
of Dante's achievement. As M. Ampere says, '^ these visions 
gave to Dante not his genius, not his poetic inspiration, but the 
form merely in which he realized it. They must not, however, 
be passed by. Genius should not be a descendant who scorns 
his humble ancestors ; it should be like a reverent son who, having 



6 The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell. 

obtained power and glory, does not despise his humble parents^ 
who are without fame." ^ 

The question of the originality of Dante's work began to be 
agitated perhaps a century and a half ago, but always in a half- 
hearted, apologetic sort of way which was necessarily fatal to the 
cause. It was not until the beginning of the nineteenth century 
that the matter began to be considered in all seriousness. The 
following bibliography, while by no means exhaustive, will serve 
to indicate the principal steps in the development of the question. 

The first real impulse to a more objective and searching study 
of Dante's work was given by F. Cancellieri's Ozzervazioni 
intorno alia Questione . . . sopra la Originalitdi del Poema di 
Dante, published in Rome in 1814. An entertaining review 
of this work in the Edinburgh Review, Vol. XXX, p. 317 f., 
1818, will serve to make us acquainted with the contents of 
Cancellieri's essay, which is rare, and at the same time will give 
us an insight into the condition of the question at that time. 

"(We have) just received/' says the reviewer, "a work almost 
unknown in England, having for its object to ascertain whether 
(Dante) was an inventor or an imitator only. The continental 
antiquaries and scholars have eagerly laid hold of a manuscript 
(the Vision of Alheric), said to have been discovered about the 
beginning of the present century, and affording evidence, accord- 
ing to some persons, that he had borrowed from others the whole 
plan and conception of his wonderful work. The question, 
indeed, is of ancient date, and long before such value had been 
set upon this manuscript, was so perplexed and prolonged as 
now to call for definitive elucidation." 

Concerning the discovery, or rather the re-discovery, of the 
Alberic vision, he says : "An extract, or rather a short abstract 
of an old vision, written in Latin, appeared in a pamphlet pub- 
lished in Rome in 1801, with an insinuation that the primitive 
model of Dante's poem had at length been discovered. Some 
reader of new publications transmitted the intelligence of the 
discovery to a German journalist, who received it as of the utmost 
importance ; and from him a writer in a French paper (the 
Publiciste of July, 1809), transcribed, embellished, and diffused it 

^Hist Lilt, de la France, II, p. 134 f. 



The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell. 7 

over all Europe. Having nothing to do with politics, everybody 
received it upon the faith of the author of the pamphlet, by 
whom alone the MS. had been read ; and it was immediately 
settled by the wits and critics of the day, that Dante was but 
the versifier of the ideas of others. Mr. Cancellieri, a professed 
black-letter scholar, and animated, no doubt, with a laudable zeal 
for religion as well as for literature, published the vision entire 
in 1814. . . J' 

The writer then points out the unjustness of an attempt to 
account for Dante's work on the basis of one short vision, and 
intimates the existence of any number of similar works in the 
Middle Ages. 

But the old school of idolaters died hard, and it was not until 
almost thirty years later that this matter became settled beyond 
all reasonable question. During these thirty years Ozanam, to 
be sure, had on several occasions hinted at the existence of a 
vast well from which Dante obviously drew; but his remarks were, 
in the main, sporadic and incidental, and, therefore, were not 
accorded the reverent consideration which this distinguished 
scholar's work had usually received. 

But in 1842, M. Charles Labitte published in the Revue des 
Deux Mondes of that year, p. 704 f., his essay, entitled. La Divine 
Com^die avant Dante. It is a thorough study of other-world 
visions in classical antiquity and in Christian times. In his 
introductory remarks Labitte says: ^' {The Divine Comedy), as a 
matter of fact, original and bizarre though it may appear, is not 
a spontaneous creation, the sublime caprice of a divinely-gifted 
artist. On the contrary, it harks back to a whole cycle which 
preceded it ; to a permanent thought which reappears periodically 
in the ages which go before ; — a thought at first shapeless, de- 
veloping little by little, until finally a man of genius possesses 
himself of it, and gives it a fixed and definite form in a 
masterpiece.'' 

In 1844 a similar and perhaps even more erudite work on the 
subject of other-world visions appeared in London : Thomas 
Wright's St. Patrick^s Purgatory: An Essay on the Legends of 
Purgatory, Hell, and Paradise. Wright does not consider these 
visions in their possible relation to Dante at all, but naturally 



8 The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell. 

follows lines similar to those laid down by Labitte, though the 
two works were written quite independently of each other. 
Wright, too, treats far more fully than did his predecessor the 
other-world legends of Ireland, a country singularly rich in this 
particular branch of literature. 

Emboldened by these practically pioneer essays (for the work 
of Cancellieri, and the slight contribution in the Edinburgh 
Review, were as well as forgotten), Ozanam incorporated the results 
of his own investigations in an essay, which appeared in 1845, 
entitled, J^tudes sur les Sources Poetiques de la Divine Com^die} 
Ozanam, while repeating much of what Labitte had given us, 
adds valuable new material, especially from Italian literature? 
and the essay is a decided advance upon all previous works on 
the subject. 

The works of both Labitte and Ozanam are reviewed briefly, and 
not very ably, in the Norih American Review for January, 1847. 

In 1851 Tischendorf published a valuable essay in Theologische 
Studien und Kritihen, 24, chiefly in reference to the Vision of St. 
Paul and other similar apocryphal works.^ 

In 1865 there is a slight contribution from Albana Megnaty, 
entitled, An Historical Sketch of the Life and Times oj Dante 
Alighiey^ij with an Outline of the Legendary History of Helly 
Purgatory and Paradise Previous to the Divina Commedia. 

Late in the '60's Ozanam again appears with a whole volume on 
the subject — containing, to be sure, much material not directly 
connected — entitled. La Poesie Catholique au XLII^ Sitcle.^ On p. 
473 of this work he edits a thirteenth century French version 
of the Vision of St. Paul, and points out for the first time its 
resemblance in general tone, and in much of the detail, to the 
Divina Commedia. 

In 1874 Allessandro d'Ancona published a work entitled, 
I Precursori di Dante, to which I have not had access. 

In 1876 Octave Delepierre published a treatise rather elabo- 
rately, entitled, HEnfer ; Essai Philosophique et Historique sur les 
Legendes de la Vie Future (London, Truebner). The work is 
modelled in method upon Wright's book, and is not a masterly 

^ Republished in Vol. V, p. 378 f., of the complete ed. of Ozanam's works, 1872. 
' Cf. also his Apocall. Apocr., xiv-xviii; 34-69. ^ Sixth ed., 1872, Vol. 6. 



The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell. 9 

performance — at least, it presents bnt little new material. Great 
stress is laid upon the similarity in form and execution between 
Dante's work and the Vision of Tundale, though the author dis- 
claims any imitation on the part of the Italian ]K)et. The essay 
was twice published; the second time under the title of Le Livre 
des Visions, illustrated, and limited to twenty-five copies. 

In 1892 the fragment of the Apocalypse of Peter was discovered, 
and published with a translation and an introductory essay by 
Mr. Montao;ue Rhodes James. This work will be treated in 
detail later on. 

The latest work in the field of vision-literature in general has 
appeared in recent issues of Romanische Forschungen. In Vol. 
II (1886), C. Fritzsche published an article. Die Lateinischen 
Visionen des Mittelalters bis zur Blitfe des XII ten Jahrhunderts, 
concluded in Vol. III. It consists, as its title implies, of a 
catalogue of medieval Latin visions, arranged in chronological 
order. A short explanatory essay is appended. In Vol. V, p. 
539, there is an interesting study by L. Schermann, to which 
reference will again be made later, entitled, Eine Art Visiondrer 
Hbllenschilderung aus dem Indischen Mittelalter, This article, much 
amplified, was separately published, under the title, Materialien 
zur Geschichte der Indischen Visionslitteratur, in Leipzig, 1892. 

In Vol. VI II, E. Peters, Zitr Geschichte der Lateinischen Visions- 
legenden, supplements Fritzsche's work. 

I. SOURCES AND GENERAL DEVELOPMENT 
OF THE VISIONS. 

1. Oriental Analogues. 

It is not within the scope of the present study to review, even 
briefly, the various doctrines concerning a future life which are 
advanced in the different Oriental theogonies. But no survey 
of the history of visions would be complete without an indication, 
at least, of the most striking parallels between the pagan and 
Christian accounts. In almost every case the former can claim 
chronological priority, and may therefore be considered the first 
step in the chain of vision-development. 



10 The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell. 

Upham, in his History of Buddhism^ was at some pains to 
point out tlie resemblance between many of the torments of the 
Buddhist hells and of the Divina Commedia. And it is in these 
accounts that we find the most striking analogues to the incidents 
of the Christian visions. The chief lines of similarity may be 
briefly indicated. 

The number of hells varies in Buddhistic accounts, but the 
favorite figure is 136: 8 principal and 128 subordinate hells.^ 
The torments are, of course, not the same in all accounts ; but the 
following abstract (in which only the eight principal hells are 
considered) will serve the present purpose.^ 

The first hell is the place of the damned where they are cut 
in pieces by several sorts of weapons, and brought to life again. 
Here they will be torn to pieces by glowing hot irons, and then 
exposed to intense cold. After a time their limbs will again 
unite, and again be torn asunder and exposed to the cold; and 
this alternation of misery will endure for 500 infernal years. 

The second hell is the place where the damned are hewn 
with red-hot axes. On a bed of fire they will be extended, and, 
like so many trunks of trees, with burning iron saws and hooks 
they will be cut into eight or ten pieces, for 1,000 infernal years. 

The third hell is the place where the dead are squeezed with 
red-hot iron rocks, which roll from the four sides of hell. They 
will be ground between four burning mountains for 2,000 in- 
fernal years. 

The fourth hell is the place where the damned are tormented 
by the flame having entered into them by the nine openings 
of their body. They will have their hearts consumed by fire 
entering their mouths, etc., for 4,000 infernal years. 

The fifth hell is the place where the damned undergo great 
misery; tears red as blood and hot as fire proceed from their 
eyes for 8,000 infernal years. 

The sixth hell is the place where the damned are tormented 

'P. 104f. 

*In the Pur^nas the usual number is seven. In the Garuda-Purana, however, 
the number is fixed at 8,400,000. Cf. Benfey, Hermes, Minos, Tariaros, Abh. der 
kgl. Gesellsch. der Wiss. zur Gottingen, xxii (1879), p. 36 f. 

'^Cf. Upham, loc. ciL, p. 108. Also Asiatic Researches, VI, 220. 



The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell. 1 1 

by being fixed on red-hot iron pins, which are fastened to the 
burning floor. They will be tumbled down headlong from a 
lofty burning mountain ; then, being transfixed on an iron spit, 
they will be cut and torn by demons with swords and spears 
for 16,000 infernal years. 

The seventh hell is the place where the damned are placed 
on red-hot iron rocks, and being unable to stand on them, fall 
down headlong on the hot iron floor, from which protrude red- 
hot iron spikes as large as palmeira logs. They will be first 
fixed with their heads downwards, and then transfixed with red- 
hot spits as large as palm trees. 

The eighth hell is the place of the damned, who are burned 
constantly by the fire which proceeds in an immense quantity 
from every side of that hell, by which fire the extent of 100 
yodoons of the hell is filled up. They will be punished for a 
whole world in the most terrible of all hells, the pavement of 
which, nine yojanas in thickness, is of red-hot iron, and emits 
the most horrible smoke and the most piercing flame. 

In the first hell we are confronted with two of the most 
characteristic features of a large number of Christian visions. 
The fact that the souls, after being torn and mangled beyond 
possibility of recognition, again take on their original shape, 
in order to undergo renewed torment, is constantly emphasized 
in the Christian accounts. Compare, for example, Tundale, who, 
being delivered by the guiding angel to the fury of the fiends, is 
hewn into '' gobettes smale,^^ 

He myght not dey with that payne, 

For he was made al hole agayne. — 1. 765.' 

The torment of alternate heat and extreme cold is a well-nigh 
universal feature throughout the vision-literature. It is interest- 
ing to note that we also find it in the Book of Enoch,^ and it 
was probably through the medium of this work that the feature 
found its way into the Christian visions. We find it in the 

' Wherever it is possible to do so, reference will be made to the English versions 
of the works quoted. 

-XIV, 11; cf. p. 22, below. 



12 The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell. 

fourth century Vision of St. Paul, which had perhaps a greater 
influence than any other siugle work upon subsequent similar 
accounts. In England, Bede introduces the feature into the Vision 
of Drihthelm, whence it was communicated to other specifically 
English visions. It is a feature of the Anglo-Saxon hell (See 
below), occurring both in the poetry and in the prose. The 
homilists almost invariably employ it in general descriptions 
of hell. Compare, for example, Aelfric : "The eyes will smart 
with the powerful smoke and the teeth quake with the great chill ; 
for the reprobates shall, suffer intolerable heat, and unspeakable 
chill.'' ^ Or again: "There shall be weeping and gnashing of 
teeth : for their eyes shall be tormented in the great burning, 
and their teeth shall afterwards quake in the intense cold.''^ 

Examples could be multiplied.^ 

The torment of the second hell — hewing with red-hot axes — 
would naturally suggest itself to any imaginative torment-deviser, 
and we therefore find the feature, with various modifications and 
elaborations, all through vision-literature. It constitutes one of 
the most horrible episodes of Dante's hell. 

For the torment of the third hell, where the souls are squeezed 
with red-hot iron rocks, there seem to be no exact parallels in 
Christian accounts. The rocks, to be sure, recall the torture of 
the prodigal and the avaricious in the Divina Commedia, but very 
distantly. The mention of the " four sides " of hell has probably 
no special significance, though it recalls vaguely the Anglo-Saxon 
account of the wind blowing from the "four corners,"* and the 
" four fires " of the Vision of Fur sens. 

The fourth and fifth hells present no points of similarity to 
the Christian accounts, except in a very general way. Perhaps 
we have an echo of the fourth — where the flame enters by the 
nine openings of the body — in the Apocalypse of Peter, § 14 : 
^And over against these were again other men and women . . . 
having flaming fire in their mouth," etc. 

The sixth hell seems again to be in organic connection with 
the Christian accounts. In the Apocalypse of Peter we find the 

1 Thorpe, I, 531. '^ Ibid, i, 133. 

^ Cf. e. g. Blickling Homily V ; Morris, p. 60. Poema Morale, 1. 

* Crist, line 878. 



The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell, 13 

following paragraph (15): "And in a certain other place were 
pebbles sharper than swords or than any spit, red-hot, and 
women and men, clad in filthy rags, were rolling upon them in 
torment . . ." The hot iron floor is one of the most elaborate 
features of the Vision of Tundale} 

The lofty mountains are a not uncommon feature of Christian 
accounts. They occur in one or another form in the visions of 
the Monk of Wenlok, Wettin, Drihthelm, Monk of Eynsham, 
and others. Souls are hurled from cliffs in the Apocalypse of 
Peter (17) : "And there were other men and women being hurled 
down from a great cliff, and they reached the bottom and again 
were driven by those that were set upon them to climb up upon 
the cliff, and thence they were hurled down again, and they had 
no rest from this torment." 

In the Vision of Alberio the mountains are of ice. 

Impaling is a feature which we should naturally expect to 
find in any catalogue of physical torments, and its frequent re- 
currence in the visions is not surprising. In the Divina Com- 
7aedia, Caiaphas is fixed to a cross on the ground.^ 

Placing sinners upon their heads (seventh hell) recalls the 
pits into which Dante plunges some of his damned headfore- 
most. Dante's immediate source for this feature was probably 
the Vision of Alberie, but the similarity is none the less remark- 
able, especially as Dante places his pits in the " livid stone," 
which would seem to be the red-hot rocks of the Buddhistic 
accounts.^ See also St. Palrich^s Purgatory (Sect. 4).* 

The eighth hell offers no new features. In the Vision of 
Tundale, the iron floor is also assigned a specified thickness. 

The foregoing very brief review shows sufficiently clearly that 
an organic connection exists between the Buddhistic conceptions 
of hell-torment and the Christian. A perusal of Schermann's 
article (cited above, page 9) will show that these conceptions 
developed in the East in just the same manner as in Europe, 
though not, in the case of the former, generally in the form of 

^ Section 4. ^ Inferno, Canto xix. ' Inferno, Canto xxiii. 

^The Middle-english visions will throughout be referred to by the Sections 
into which I have divided them in Part III of my study. 



14 The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell. 

visions. In the Brahmanistic Mdrkandeya-Purdna,^ the earliest 
work of this nature extant, and which still reflects the earliest 
conceptions of epic mythology, we find a very similar division 
of hells. The doctrine of metempsychosis is the basis of the 
account. In the first hell, called Kaurava (= howling), the 
sinner is forced to run about over glowing coals ; in the next, 
called Maharaurava (= howling loudly), he is bound down 
upon a floor of burning copper, and is torn to pieces by all 
sorts of animals. In the third, called Tamas (= darkness), the 
torments of extreme cold, darkness, hunger, thirst, etc., are in- 
flicted. A driving wind and hail-sto!rm (of. Drihthelm) breaks 
the bones of the damned, and presses out the marrow and blood. 
Any number of parallels to this in the Christian accounts will 
at once suggest themselves. In the next hell, called Nikrintana 
(= cutting to pieces), souls are fixed upon a constantly rotating 
disk, and are sawed apart from head to foot by demons with 
the hdlasutra, or black thread.^ {Cf. the burning wheel of 8L 
PauVs Vision and of 8t. Patrick's Purgatory.) In the fifth 
hell, called Apratishtha (= supportless, immeasurably deep), 
sinners are fastened to wheels ; blood streams from their mouths, 
tears from their eyes. This torment endures for 1,000 years. 
The torment of the next hell, Asipatravana (= sword-leaf forest), 
possesses particular interest for us. In the centre of this hell 
there is a forest, the leaves of which are sword-blades. Allured 
by the pleasant appearance and cool shade of this forest, the 
souls enter to seek relief from their thirst and pain. But the 
wind drives the sword-leaves down upon them and they sink 
down upon the flaming ground, where they are attacked and torn 
to pieces by countless numbers of tiger-like dogs. 

The sword-leaves at once recall the burning, sword-leaved trees 
which guard the entrance to hell, and to which souls are affixed 
by various portions of the body — a feature peculiar, as far as I 
know, to the visions of St. Paul and Alberic. In the last hell, 
Taptakumbha (= provided with glowing caldrons), sinners are 
hurled headforemost (c/. 8th Buddhist hell, above) into jars of 
boiling oil and iron-dust. Skull and bones burst asunder, the 

^Schermann, loc. cit., page 544 f. Materialien, etc., p. 33. 

* Probably not "death-thread." Cf. Schermann, Materialien, etc., p. 36, note. 



The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell. 16 

marrow spurts out, the mangled limbs are devoured by vultures, 
while the demons stir about with spoons the " liquid '' soul. 
(Compare Tandale.) 

This account further resembles especially Timdale and St, 
Pab'ick^s Purgatory, in that the narrator himself undergoes 
many of the torments described. We find here also the teach- 
ing which plays an important part in the Buddhistic system, as 
it does especially in the Avesta, and, in a less marked degree, in 
the Old Testament, namely, the division of earthly actions into 
thought, word, and deed, all of which will be revealed to the 
great Judge.^ An especially interesting survival of this is in 
the Anglo-Saxon poetry, especially Crist. Compare, for exa^iple, 

1. 1036 : 

Sceal on leoht cuman 
sinra weorca wlite and worda gemynd, 
and heortan gehygd fore heofona cyning. 

Or again, Crist, 1045 f: 

Opene weor^a'S 
ofer middangeard monna daede. 
Ne magun hord wera heortan ge)?ohtas 
for waldende wihte bemi}>an.^ 

Another characteristic Christian feature which this account fur- 
nishes is that a suitable punishment is meted out for every crime. 
Thus, birds with beaks of adamantine hardness pluck out the 
eyes of such as had cast lustful glances ; backbiters, slanderers, 
etc., have their tongues cut with sharp shears {cf. Apocalypse of 
Peter, 14); the hands of such as had touched sacred things before 
purifying them are plunged into pots of fire ; etc. 

These examples will suffice to show the relationship which 
exists between the Indian religions and Christianity in regard 
to conceptions of hell. A similar result is gained from a com- 
parison of the conceptions of an abode of the blessed. For a 
study of the development within Buddhism, I again refer to 
Schermann's article. 

^Schermann, loc. ciL, p. 653. Cf. especially Cowell, "Thought, Word, and 
Deed," Journ. of Phil., iii. 
" Cf. also Bede, Vision of Fur sens, Hist. Eccl. V, 13. 



16 The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell. 

Turning now to other oriental religions, we find only isolated 
incidents which have been carried over into the Christian accounts. 

The fate of the Egyptian soul after death is briefly as follows : ^ 

The soul is led by the god Thoth into Amenthe, the infernal 
world, the entrance to which lies in the extreme west, on the 
farther side of the sea, where the sun goes down under the 
earth. ... At the entrance sits a wide-throated monster, over 
whose head is the inscription, " This is the devourer of many 
who go into Amenthe, the lacerator of the heart of him who 
comes with sins to the house of justice.'^ The soul next kneels 
before the forty-two assessors of Osiris ; it then comes to the 
final trial in the hall of the two' Truths, the approving and the 
condemning. . . . Here the soul is weighed in the balance. 
In one scale an image of Thmei, the goddess of truth, is placed ; 
in the other a heart-shaped vase, symbolizing the heart of the 
deceased with all the actions of his earthly life. Thoth notes the 
result on a tablet, and the deceased advances with it to the foot 
of the throne on which sits Osiris, lord of the dead, king of 
Amenthe. He pronounces the decisive sentence, and his assist- 
ants see that it is at once executed. The soul, if condemned, is 
either scourged back to earth straightway, to live again in the 
form of a vile animal ; or it is plunged into a hell of fire ; or it 
is driven into the atmosphere to be tossed about by tempests 
until its sins be expiated, and another probation granted through 
a renewed existence in human form. 

At least two of the features of this account have crept into 
the Christian visions — the wide-throated monster and the scales 
of justice. It is most probable, however, that they came through 
the medium of the Greek. 

In the Vision of ThurcilP we have, with the substitution of 
Christian saints for heathen deities, and with the addition of pur- 
gatory, a remarkable survival of the Egyptian conception of 
judgment. In the great judgment-hall to which Thurcill is led 
by his guide (St. Julian), Sts. Michael, Peter, and Paul sit in 
judgment upon the souls. In the Egyptian accounts, the three 
judges are Horus, An u bis, and Thoth. Thoth is also the guide, 

^ Alger, History of the Doctrine of a Future Life, p. 102. 
^ Section 6. 



The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell. 17 

here St. Julian. Perfectly white souls are assigned to St. Michael, 
who sends them unharmed through the flames ; spotted souls are 
sent by Peter to purgatory ; whereas Paul and the devil (Osiris 
in the Egyptian account) sit one at each end of a large pair of 
scales, in which are weighed the black souls. If the scales turn 
to the saint, the soul is sent to purgatory ; but if to the devil, 
it is hurled into a fiery pit just at PauFs feet.^ 

The tempests of the Egyptian account recur frequently in the 
visions. 

Turning to the Persian theogony,^ we find the one feature 
which links Orient and Occident most unmistakably together — 
the feature which is still a doctrine in the Mohammedan system — 
the bridge of judgment. This, more than any other single inci- 
dent, seems to have struck the popular fancy, and we find it 
recurring constantly throughout early and medieval Christian 
literature, not only in the visions, where we should naturally 
expect to find it, but in the romances as well."^ 

In the Khordah-Avesta we find the following brief mention 
of the bridge : "... the wisdom of wisdoms, which effects free- 
dom from hell for the soul at the bridge, and leads it over to 
that Paradise, the brilliant, the sweet-smelling of the pure.^' 

The account of the bridge in the Viraf-Nameh is as follows : 
" On the soaring bridge the soul meets Rashnerast, the angel of 
justice,who tries those that present themselves before him. If the 
merits prevail, a figure of dazzling substance, radiating glory and 
fragrance, advances and accosts the justified soul, saying : I am 
thy good angel ; I was pure at the first, but thy good deeds have 
made me purer ; and the happy one is straightway led to Paradise. 
But when the vices outweigh the virtues, a dark and frightful 
image, featured with ugliness, and exhaling a noisome smell, meets 
the condemned soul and cries : I am thy evil spirit ; bad myself, 
thy crimes have made me worse. Then the culprit staggers on 

^ For three-fold division of souls in Anglo-Saxon, etc., cf. ii, 3, below. 
'^ Cf. Huebschmann, " Die persische Lehre vom Jenseits," etc. Jahrh. fur prot. 
Theol. V, p. 48. 
•^ Cf Gaston Paris : " Le Conte de la Charrette." Romania, xii, p. 508 f. 

2 



18 The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell. 

his uncertain foothold, is hurled from the dizzy causeway, and 
precipitated into the gulf which yawns horribly below.^" 

In the visions, the bridge is sometimes one of the torments 
of hell, at others, " the bridge of purgatory." The first Christian 
vision in which we find it is that of St. Paul. 

The Mohammedan bridge, al Sirat, has precisely the attributes 
which are usually bestowed upon it in the Christian accounts. 
It is thinner than a hair, sharper than a razor, and hotter than 
flame, spanning in one frail arch the immeasurable distance, 
directly over hell, from earth to paradise. Every orthodox Mus- 
sulman firmly holds this as a physical fact to be surmounted on 
the last day. Mohammed leading the way, the faithful and 
righteous will traverse it with ease, and as quickly as a flash of 
lightning. The thin edge broadens beneath their steps, the sur- 
rounding support of convoying angels' wings hides the fire-lake 
below from their sight, and they are swiftly enveloped in paradise. 
But as the infidel with his evil deeds essays to cross, thorns 
entangle his steps, the lurid glare beneath blinds him, and he 
soon topples over and whirls into the blazing abyss. 

Representative visions in which the bridge figures are : St. Paul, 
fourth century; Monk of Wenlok, eighth century; Tundale, AlberiCy 
twelfth century ; St. Patrick's Purgatory (where the bridge broadens 
just as in the Mohammedan account), Thurcilly thirteenth century. 

In the eighteenth century Persian Dabistan,^ or School of 
Manners, the soul, when upon the bridge of judgment, is enveloped 
in a fetid mist, from which issues a terrible figure. "Who art 
thou ? " asks the spirit. " I am the personification of thy acts 
and deeds,'' answers the apparition. The bridge is sharper than 
a razor, and the wicked soul, having gone a little way with great 
difficulty, at last falls into the infernal gulf below. 

The Dahistan is interesting in many ways from our point of 
view ; and the fact that it was composed in modern times goes 
to show how strong a hold these popular conceptions of hell 
have gained. Both in form and in content it is the counterpart 
of a medieval vision, and I am prompted to close this brief 
survey of the oriental side of our subject with an abstract of 

^Alger, loc. cit., p. 136 f. ' Translation of Shea and Troyer, p. 293 f. 



The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell. 19 

the section dealing with the pains of hell. The account begins 
thus : "Ardaiviraf, having drunk a cup of hallowed wine . . . 
lay down on a couch and did not arise before the expiration of 
a week ; his spirit, through the efficacy of the divine word, having 
been separated from the body. On the eighth day, Ardai, arising 
from sleep, ordered a scribe to be brought, who should commit to 
writing all his words; and he thus spake : When I fell asleep 
Sirushi, the Angel of Paradise, came near. ... I explained the 
motives of my coming to the other world. He took my hand 
and said, Ascend three steps. I obeyed, and arrived at the 
Chanyud Pul, or the st^'aight bridge of judgment. The accom- 
panying angel pointed me out the road, when I beheld a bridge 
finer than a hair and, sharper than a razor, and strong, and its 
length was thirty-seven rasans. . . . I beheld a spirit just parted 
from the body in a state of tranquillity. On its arrival at the 
bridge a fragrant gale came from the East, out of which issued 
a beautiful, nymph-like form, the like of which I never before 
beheld. The spirit asked her, Who art thou? . . . She replied, 
I am the personification of thy good deeds. After this the angel, 
taking me out of paradise, bore me off to behold the punishments 
inflicted on those in hell." 

Then follows a catalogue of thirty-four distinct torments for as 
many crimes. Close analogues are found in Christian accounts 
to the following : 

1. Black and gloomy river of fetid water, with weeping multi- 
tudes falling in and drowning. 

2. The bridge of judgment. 

3. Road through snow, ice, storms, intense cold, mephitic ex- 
halations and obscurity,^ along a region full of pits, in which 
were myriads of spirits suffering tortures. 

4. Ser[>ents in the pits. 

6. Woman holding in her hand a cup filled with blood and 
-corrupted matter, which she is forced to drink.^ 

10. Woman suspended by her breasts, and noxious creatures 
falling on her.^ 

^ Cf. particularly Vision of Paul, Sect. 3. 
^ Of. Apocalypse of Peter, 11. 
^Ibid., 9. Also Paul, sect. 9. 



20 The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell. 

12. Woman hung up by her tongue.^ 

14. Men hung up and lashed with gnawing serpents.^ 

21. Men tormented by worms and serpents. 

30. Number of persons up to their necks in snow and ice.^ 

2. Influence of Classical Antiquity. 

It will be impossible to give in this place a catalogue of the 
elements which found their way into the visions from the rich 
mythologies of classical times. For parallels of a general character 
I refer to the early pages of M. Labitte's essay ."^ It has already 
been said (p. 16, above), that the Greek was in all probability 
the medium through which several details of the Egyptian con- 
ception of an after-life crept into Christianity; such as, for ex- 
ample, the Cerberus myth, and the scales of justice. The rivers 
of hell reflect Acheron and Styx ; the thread which Ariadne 
gave to Theseus to guide him through the labyrinth of the 
Minotaur springs up again in the ninth century Vision of Chaiies 
the Fat, where, to be sure, it has assumed many distinctly medi- 
eval attributes. The " lux atra '^ of Virgil may be the '' black 
fire" of the Anglo-Saxon hell. Many visions, such as that 
of Tundale, introduce Greek and Latin proper names. In St^ 
Patrick'' s Purgatory , too, we find classical references. 

The more specific points of affinity will be indicated in the 
course of the study. 

Some influence of a very general character may have been 
exerted upon later descriptions of heaven by Cicero's Somnium 
Scipionis. The visions, however, owe very little to it. 

The Vision of Thespesius, written at a time when the glory of 
Kome had already begun to fade, will be discussed in detail in 
a subsequent section. 



^Apocalypse of Peter, 7, and note. * Cf. particularly Vision of Alberic, 

*Ihid. 4 Of. also Nutt, The Happy Otherworld, p. 255 f. 



The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell. 21 



3. The Old Testament. 

Old Testament scriptures furnish no description of a place of 
punishment sufficiently detailed to warrant bringing it into im- 
mediate relation with vision-literature. There can, however, be 
little doubt that the custom of prophesying and admonishing 
from a vision basis originated here, and was the direct stimulus 
for the similar procedure in the Christian accounts. Isaiah, 
Ezekiel, Daniel, Obadiah, and the minor Old Testament vision- 
aries, all contributed something to the result, though probably 
less than the apocryphal Book of Enoch. 

The doctrine of a hell of fire is clearly expressed in the Old 
Testament, Deut., xxxii, 22 : " For a fire is kindled in mine 
anger, and shall burn unto the lowest hell.'' The "pains of 
hell " are referred to in Ps. cxvi, 3 : " The sorrows of death 
compassed me, and the pains of hell got hold upon me." See also 
Ps. XVI, 10; LV, 15; cxxxix, 8. 

Hell is a pit beneath the earth: Is., xiv, 15: "Yet thou 
shalt be brought down to hell, to the sides of the pit." Ezek., 

XXXI, 16 : " . . . when I cast him down to hell with them that 
descend into the pit." 17: " They also went down into hell ..." 

XXXII, 27 : " Which are gone down to hell with their weapons 
of war." Contrasted positions of heaven and hell clearly ex- 
pressed in Amos, ix, 2 : " Though they dig into hell, thence 
shall mine hand take them ; though they climb up to heaven, 
thence will I bring them down." Hell is deep : Prov., ix, 18 : 
^^ But he knoweth not that the dead are there, and that her guests 
are in the depths of hell." Job, xxiv, 19 : "Drought and heat 
consume the snow waters ; so doth the grave those which have 
sinned," has been adduced as evidence of the double torments 
of heat and cold in purgatory. 

The closest analogues to the general form of the Christian 
visions are Ezek., i-x ; Daniel, vii, viii, x. Specific passages 
will be indicated in the course of the study. 

For an exposition of the theory which would derive the Christian 
hell immediately from the Hellenic one, I refer to Prof. Percy 
Gardner's essay in the Contemporaj^y Review, March, 1895, and 
to Nutt, loc. cit, where further references will be found. 



22 The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell. 



4. The Book of Enoch. 

[References are to Dr. Richard Laurence's translation of the Ethiopic MS, 
in the Bodleian Library. Published by Kegan Paul, Trench & Co., 1883]. 

The date of the Booh of Enoch is about 110 B. C, though 
it is impossible to fix an exact date (see the Introduction ta 
Laurence\s translation). The work was probably well-known 
in early Christian times, and was possibly the channel through 
which several Oriental conceptions of hell crept into Christian 
accounts.^ The following extracts have immediate bearing upon 
our subject. The special points of connection are in italics. 

XIV, 8. A vision thus appeared to me. 9. . . . Winds in 
the vision assisted my flight. 10. They elevated me aloft to 
heaven. I proceeded until I arrived at a wall built with stones 
of crystal? 11. ... A spacious habitation, built also with stones 
of crystal. . . . Cherubim of fire in a stormy sky.^ . . . When 
I entered into this dwelling it was hot as fire and cold as ice* 
No trace of delight or of life was ihere. Terror overwhelmed 
me, and a fearful shaking seized me. 13. Violently agitated 
and trembling, I fell upon my face.^ . . . 14. There was 
another habitation more spacious than the former. ... 15. So 
greatly did it excel in all points, in glory, in magnificence, and 
in magnitude, that it is impossible to describe to you either the 
extent or the splendor of it.^ 16. Its floor was on fire ^ . . . there 
was an exalted throne . . . and there was the voice of cherubim. 
19. From underneath this mighty throne rivers of fiaming fire^ 
issued. . . . 

XV, XVI. [The Lord tells Enoch what he is to preach to 
the people.]^ 

' The influence of Enoch on the Christian conceptions of heaven was certainly 
very great, but cannot be traced in detail here. 

^ Cf. Monk of Eynsham, sect. 8. ^ Thespesius; Ezek., r, 13 f. 

*Cf. p. 11, above. ^Inferno, v, 142. ^ Cf. Apocalypse of Peter, 5. 

^Buddhist Hells, 6-8, p. lOf., above. Also Tundale, sect. 4. 

^ Cf. Apocalypse of Peter, 8. 

^Visionaries are customarily told by their guides to preach what they have 
seen for the benefit of mankind. Even Dante : 

. . . . e quel che vedi 
Ritornato di la, fa che tu scrive. 



The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell. 23 

Xyil, 2. They carried me to a lofty spot, to a mountain,^ the 
top of which reached to heaven. 4. I came to a river of fire, 
ivhich flowed like water. 

XVIir, 2. I surveyed the stone which supports the corners 

of the earth, and the firmament of heaven. I also beheld the 

four winds'^ which bear up tlie earth, and the firmament. . . . 

13. And in the columns of heaven I beheld fires ^ which descended 

without number. 

XXI, 3. ... I beheld seven stars of heaven hound . . . 
together,^ like great mountains, and like a blazing fire. I ex- 
claimed, For what species of crime have they been removed to 
this place? Then Uriel, one of the holy angels who was with 
me, and ivho conducted me,^ answered. . . . These are those of 
the stars which have transgressed the commandment of the most 
high God, and are here bound until the infinite number of the 

# days of their crimes be completed. 4. From thence I afterwards 
passed to another terrific place, 5. where I beheld the operation 
of a great fire blazing and glittering, in the midst of which there 
was a division.^ Columns of fire struggled to the end of the 
abyss, and deep was their descent. But neither its measure nor 
its magnitude was I able to discover.^ . . . Then I exclaimed, 
How terrible is this place, and how difficult to explore ! 6. Uriel 
. . . said. This is the prison of the angels, and here they are 
kept forever. 

XXII, 1. From thence I proceeded to another spot, where I 
saw on the west a great and lofty mountain^ a strong rock, and 
four delightful places. 2. Internally it was deep, capacious and 

very smooth. 3. . . . Here will be collected all the souls of 
men, 4. . . . until the day of judgment. 9. At that time, there- 
fore, I inquired . . . respecting the general judgment, saying. 
Why is one separated from another ? He answered, jTAree sepa- 

^ For occurrence of mountains in visions, cf. p. 41, below. 

2 QT. A. S. Crist, line 878. Also p. 12, above. 

^ Cf. Tunclale, section 12. 

" Cf. Apocalypse of Peter, 9. '^Ihid., 2. ^ Cf. Furseus. 

^ The size of hell was a favorite subject for speculation among the vision- 
writers. Such vague phrases as " as deep as the distance from heaven to earth," 
etc., are employed most frequently. The Anglo-Saxon poem, Crist and Satan, 
1. 721, represents it as 100,000 miles in extent from top to bottom. 



24 The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell, 

rations^ have been made between the spirits of the dead, and 
thus have the spirits of the righteous been separated. 10. Namely, 
by a chasm, by water, and by light above it. 

XXIV, 1. I went to another place, and saw a mountain of 
flre^ flashing both by day and by night. I proceeded towards 

it and perceived seven splendid mountains, 2. . . . and odor- 
iferous trees surrounded them. 3. Among these there was a tree 
of a7i unceasing smell, .... its leaf, its flower and its bark 
never withered, and its fruit was beautiful.^ The fruit of this 
tree shall be given to the elect (after the final judgment). 

XXV, 1. I saw a holy mountain. ... 3. Deep, dry 
valleys. . . . 

XXVI, 2. Here shall be collected all who utter unbecoming 
language against God. 

XXVII, 1. From thence I proceeded towards the East.* 
[XXXIX, 4 f. Vision of the sainted in paradise]. 

LII, 1. Then I looked and turned myself to another part of 
the earth, where I beheld a deep valley^ burning with fire. 2. To 
this valley they brought monarchs and the mighty. 

LXVI, 4. . . . There were mountains of gold and silver, of 
iron, of fiidd metal, and of tin. 6. . . . From the fluid mass 
of fire there arose a strong smell of sulphur, which became mixed 
with the waters ; and the valley of the angels who had been 
guilty of seduction burned underneath its soil.^ 7. Through that 
valley, also, Hvers o/^re were flowing. 13. . . . When the angels 
shall be judged, then shall the heat of these springs of water 
experience an alternation. 14. And when the angels shall ascend, 
the water of the springs shall again undergo a change, and he 
frozen. 

LXX, 1. I beheld the sons of the holy angels treading on 
flaming fire, whose garments and robes were white, and whose 

^ Three-fold divisions of souls at the judgment day in Thespesius, A. S. Elene 
{cf. II, 3, below), Thurcill, sect. 6. "^ Drihthelm. 

^This particularly pleasant tree recurs in almost all Christian accounts of 
paradise. It would seem in some way to connect these stories with the holy 
rood legend. Indeed, in Thurcill we find Adam lying beneath the tree. 

* Cf. Apocalypse of Peter, 3. Also Drihthelm. ^ Cf. Tundale, sect. 4. 

* Cf. St. Patricias Purgatory, sect. 9. "^ Cf. Apocalypse of Peter, 3. 



The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell. 26 

countenances were transparent as crystal. 2. I saw two rivers of 
fire glittering like hyacinth. 7. There I beheld, in the midst 
of that light, a building raised with stones of ice; 8. and in the 
midst of these stones tongues of living fire. 

[LXXVII, 4 f. Vision of judgment]. 

[LXXXIV, f. Vision of creation, deluge, etc.] 

[XC, 4 f. Prophecy and description of judgment]. 

XCVI, 11. With disgrace, with slaughter, and in extreme 
penury shall their spirits (z. e., of the rich) be thrust into a 
furnace of fire. 

XCIX, 5. AVoe to you, ye sinners, when you shall be afflicted 
on account of the righteous in the day of great trouble, shall 
be burnt in the fire, and recompensed according to your deeds.^ 

The points of resemblance between the Book of Enoch and the 
Apocalypse of Peter will be further pointed out in the treatment 
of that work. Other possible borrowings will be indicated as 
occasion requires. 

5. The New Testament. 

Christian writers would naturally make the Gospels the basis 
for their descriptions of hell as of everything else ; and it is only 
to be expected that we should find the sporadic intimations, which 
we find there, incorporated in almost all subsequent accounts. 
But the New Testament, though somewhat more explicit in this 
particular than the Old, offers but few details of the torments 
of hell. 

Fire is, of course, the principal torment of the Christian hell, 
as contrasted with the cold and gloom of Germanic mythology.^ 
Compare Matt., v, 22 : *^ But whoever shall say. Thou fool, shall 
be in danger of hell fire.'' Mark, ix, 43 f: ^' Into the fire that 
never shall be quenched." Matt., xiii, 42, 50 : "And shall cast 
them into a furnace of fire." Matt., xviii, 8 : "To be cast into 
everlasting fire." Matt., xviii, 9 : "To be cast into hell fire." 
Matt., XXV, 41 : "Depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting 
fire," etc. Revelation is the main scriptural source from which 

' Cf. Apocalypse of Peter, 7. - Cf. the Anglo-Saxon hell, ii, 2 (a), below. 



26 The Medieval Visions of Heaven and HelL 

vision-writers drew, being itself a vision, and reflecting Old Testa- 
ment visions, especially those of Moses, Ezekiel and Daniel. Hell 
is a " bottomless pit,'' ix, 1 ; a " prison for the damned,'' ii, 10 \ 
the chief torment is fire : ^^ He shall be tormented with fire and 
brimstone," xiv, 10. The *^' lake of fire," so common a feature 
in the visions,^ is three times mentioned : " Cast alive into a 
lake of fire burning with brimstone," xix, 20 ; " and death and 
hell were cast into a lake of fire," xx, 14 ; ^' and whatsoever was 
not found written in the book of life was cast into the lake of 
fire," XX, 15. The conception of the devil, and later of hell 
itself as a dragon or serpent, probably has its first definite ex- 
pression in XX, 2 : " The dragon, that old serpent, which is the 
Devil, and Satan." 

The doctrine of the purging quality of the judgment-day fire 
is clearly brought out in I Cor., iii, 12-15. 15 : ^^ If any man's 
work shall be burned, he shall suffer loss; but he himself shall 
be saved, yet so as by fire." This is the closest approach to a 
doctrine of purgatory. The same thing holds for Anglo-Saxon. 
(Compare the discussion below.) 

6. The Gospel of Nicodemus. 

The Gospel of Nicodemus requires mention in our connection, 
not because it presents any particular points of affinity with the 
visions, but because, owing to its great popularity throughout 
the Middle Ages, and the manifold re-handlings which it under- 
went, it can hardly have failed to have exerted an indirect in- 
fluence upon them. But a passing notice is all that can be 
bestowed upon it here. For a study of the diffusion and de- 
velopment of the work in Europe, see R. P. Wuelker's essay, 
Das Evangeliiim Nikodemi in der abendldndischen LitteratuVy 
Paderborn, 1873. 

The Old English version of the Gospel has recently been edited 
by W. H. Hulme, in the Publications of the Modern Language 
Association, xiii, 4. 

^ Cy. Apocalypse of Peter, 8, 



The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell, 27 



7. The Vision of Thespesius. 

The Vision of Thespesius, recounted by Plutarch/ is deserving 
of more than passing notice from our point of view. Written by 
a non-Christian author, within our era, it anticipates, in a re- 
markable way, both the form and the content of the medieval 
Christian visions. Its features recur unmistakably in later ac- 
counts; and as Plutarch was well known to medieval writers, 
it is reasonable to suppose that there was frequently direct copy- 
ing from him. It therefore seems necessary to look upon 
Plutarch as another link in the chain of vision-development. 
The following is a brief abstract of the vision of Thespesius : 
Thespesius had all his life had dissolute and most ungodly 
habits. One day he fell headforemost from a high place, and, 
to all appearances, died, and three days later was carried forth 
to be buried. But suddenly he revived, and ever after led a 
life of the most irreproachable virtue. When pressed to tell the 
cause of this very remarkable change, he related the following 
vision : When his spirit first left his body, he saw nothing but 
a few immense stars, infinitely far apart, and casting a most 
brilliant radiance. Being borne along by an irresistible force, 
he saw the souls of those departed from life rising up in the 
form of fiery bubbles, which, bursting asunder, disclosed meii 
and women within them.^ Some of these ascended immediately 
and with astounding rapidity. Others, however, swayed about un- 
certainly, now rising, now falling, in great confusion. Thespesius, 
recognizing some of these, approaches in order to speak with 
them; the souls, however, pay no heed to him, but cling to each 
other in pairs,^ and thus linked, they continue their aimless 
flight, amidst terrible lamentations.^ Still others were in the 
uppermost regions of the air, seemingly happy, and keeping 
carefully aloof from the disorderly throng below. By one of 
these Thespesius is told that he (Thespesius) is not yet dead, 
but has come hither with the " intellectual part of his soul,'' 

^In his moral essay, De Tard. Just. Div., Goodwin's transl.,Vol. iv, p. 177. 
^Cf. JDrihthelm. ' Cf. Apocalypse of Peter, 9. 

'* This is a most striking forerunner of Dante's " bufera infernal," Inf., v, 1. 31 f. 
Cf also visions of the Nonk of Eynsham, and ThurciU. 



28 The Medieval Visions of Heaven and HelL 

the dead casting no shadow, nor winking or opening the eyes/ 
Thus encouraged, Thespesius looks more closely, and observes 
that some of the souls shine with a pure, unclouded light ; others 
have scale-like spots upon them, whereas still others are entirely 
covered with them.^ Those whose sins are light need undergo 
but a short punishment ; ^ " but if the cure of impiety require a 
greater labor, the Deity delivers them to Justice (Dis).^ But 
when Justice has given them over as altogether incurable, then 
Erinnys (the Fury) takes them in hand ; and after she has 
chased them and coursed them from one place to another,^ flyi^ig? 
yet not knowing where to fly, for shelter or relief, plagued and 
tormented with a thousand miseries, she plunges them headlong 
into an invisible abyss, the hideousness of which no tongue can 
tell.'^^ After explaining to him the significance of the various 
colors in which the souls are clad,^ the spirit carries Thespesius 
to a spacious place, in which was a vast, gaping chasm. Here 
Thespesius is suddenly deserted by his guide,^ and perceives 
other souls in the same condition as himself, who keep flying 
round and round the chasm like birds. Within, the chasm was 
filled with flowers and fragrance, and the souls soon became dis- 
solved in rapture, and gave themselves over to joy.^ Soon after, 
Thespesius is led away to look upon the torments of the damned. 
He first sees his own father, terribly gashed and wounded, who 
confesses that he had poisoned some of his guests for their gold.^^ 
Some souls had their entrails torn out; others were flayed, while 
still others, linked together in groups of two's and three's, gnawed 
and devoured each other.^^ He next saw certain lakes,^^ one of 

* This test also occurs in Dante. 

'^ Enoch, A. S. Elene, Monk of Eynsham, Thurcill. Cf. p. 32, below. 
^ Purgatory of Christian accounts. ^ Dante : la citta di Dite, Inf. , viii. 

^Alberic, Dante, Monk of Eynsham. Cf. p. 46 f., below. 
^ Thurcill, sect. 6. Also Enoch, xxi, 5 ; p. 23, above. 
"^ St. Patrick^ s Purgatory, sect. 11. ^ Drihthelm ; Tundale, sect. 3. 

^ This recalls the earthly paradise of the Christian accounts. 
'''In the later visions, it is a common thing for the visionary to have an 
interview with some close relative in torment. 

^^ Buddhist accounts; Alberic, Dante. Cf. p. 43, below. Apoc. of Peter, 19. 
'- Cf. Apocalypse of Peter, 8. 



The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell. 29 

boiling gold, another of lead, exceedingly cold,^ and a third of 
iron, which was very scaly and rugged.^ " By the sides of these 
lakes stood certain demons, that, with their instruments, like 
smiths or founders,^ put in or drew out the souls of such as had 
transgressed through avarice, etc. For the flame of the golden 
furnace having rendered these souls of a fiery and transparent 
color, they plunged them into that of lead, where, after they 
were congealed and hardened into a substance like hail, they 
were again thrown into the lake of iron, where they became 
black and deformed, and being broken and crumbled by the 
roughness of the iron, changed their form ; and being thus trans- 
formed, they were again thrown into the lake of gold, in all 
these transmutations enduring most dreadful and horrid torments.'* 
Those who suffered most were such for whose transgressions their 
children or posterity suifered. These were constantly rebuked 
and reviled by the souls of their offspring.^ The last things 
that he saw were the souls of such as were designed for a second 
life. These were bowed, bent, and transformed into all sorts 
of creatures by the force of tools and anvils, and the strength 
of workmen appointed for that purpose, that laid on without 
mercy, bruising the whole limbs of some, disjointing others and 
pounding some to powder," etc.^ 

Thespesius shortly after returns to his body. 

8. The Apocalypse of Peter. 

One of the most interesting of the many recent discoveries, 
in Egypt, of manuscripts pertaining to the New Testament was 
that, in the spring of 1892, of a small roll containing fragments 
of the Book of Enoch, the Gospel of Pete?', and the Apocalypse 
of Peter. The Gospel and the Enoch fragment are aside from 
our subject, but the Apocalypse is of vital importance in the 
study of visions. 

^ Enoch, Buddhist hells and often. Cf. p. 11, above. '■'Enoch, lxvt, 4. 

' Cf. Tundale, sect. 11. Thurcill, sect. 8 (a). 

* This whole incident has a close parallel in Tundale, sect. 4. 

^Cf. Apocalypse of Peter, 11. ^ Cf. again Tundale. 



30 The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell. 

Mr. M. R. James/ one of the first editors of the work, has, 
from external evidence, proved the Apocalypse to be a work of 
the latter part of the first century of our era. This makes it 
the earliest Christian vision which we possess — except, of course, 
that of St. John. 

For a review of the earliest literary notices of the book, and 
for an estimate of its value as a theological document, the reader 
is referred to Mr. James's essay .^ The editor has also made a 
study of the work in its relation to a number of similar sub- 
sequent works, such as the Testament of Our Lord (p. 54), the 
Vision of Josaphat (p. 58),^ the Vision of Saturus (p. 60), the 
Sibylline Oracles (p. 61), the Vision of St. Paul (p. 65), etc. 
In the following pages the work will be examined more fully 
in its relation to the remaining vision-literature, with a view to 
ascertaining just how far-reaching its influence was in this par- 
ticular field. As the Apocalypse is short, I have decided to 
reproduce it in full, and to embody my notes in the form of a 
running commentary upon the sections. I shall refer only to 
the most prominent and representative visions : those, that is, 
to which most of the countless smaller works can be traced. 
They are: Thespesius, first century; St. Paul, fourth century;* 
Fur sens, Drihthelm, seventh century; Monk of Wenlok, eighth 
century; Wettin, St. Ansgar, Charles the Fat, ninth century; 
Alberic, Tundale, St. Patrick^s Purgatory^ Monk of Eynsham, 
twelfth century; Thurcilly thirteenth century; Lazarus, fifteenth 
century. Of these, all are Christian except Thespesius. Furseus, 
Prihthelm, St. Patrick^s Purgatory, Tundale, Monk of Fynsham 
and Thurcill belong to England or Ireland, although the last 
four were also well known on the continent. St. Paul was 
familiar to Englishmen in several popular versions. Lazarus 
is a good representative of the latest visions, in most of which, 
as in this case, the pains of hell — usually eleven, sometimes nine,^ 

^ The Gospel According to Peter and the Revelation of Peter: Two Lectures, by 
J. Armitage Robinson, B. D., and Montague Rhodes James, M. A. London, 1892. 

« P. 39 f. 

^ In the History of Barlaam and Josaphat: Boissonade, Anecdota Oraeca, 
IV, pp. 280, 360. 

^ This vision, however, belongs in its more expanded form to the ninth century. 

* Cf. Cursor Mundi, ed. Morris, iii, p. 1327. 



The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell. 31 

in number — have been displaced by the more specific torments 
for the seven deadly sins. 

I shall employ Mr. James's division of the Apocalypse into 
sections. Section 1 does not concern us, but I adduce it for the 
sake of completeness. 

1. Many of them will be false prophets, and will teach ways 
and various doctrines of perdition : and they will be sons of 
perdition. And then will God come unto my faithful ones that 
are hungering and thirsting and suffering oppression, and proving 
their own souls in this life; and He will judge the sons of 
lawlessness. 

2. And the Lord said furthermore, '^ Let us go unto the 
mountain and pray." And as we twelve disciples went with 
Him, we besought Him that He would show us one of our 
righteous brethren that had departed from the world, that we 
might see of what form they were, and so take courage, and 
encourage them also that should hear us. 

This paragraph brings us at once into the atmosphere of the 
later visions. The Guide, so common a feature in subsequent 
accounts, is in this case Christ himself. This conception of a 
guide — now a guardian angel, again a purely arbitrary person- 
age — is possibly of Oriental origin.^ 

Tlie belief in a guardian angel, who watched each individual 
through life, was general during the Middle Ages.^ The idea 
of the good and bad angel, who together watch over a mortal, 
may have developed out of this, or it may have been brought 
from Persia, together with the bridge of judgment. 

This paragraph also fixes the time of the action of the vision. 
It is the only account which we possess which falls within the 
lifetime of Christ. Whether it was really written when it purports 
to have been, we are of course unable to decide. It is very 
unlikely that Peter himself was the writer. But it differs radi- 
cally from the Pauline vision in point of face-evidence as to 
time. In the latter, though Paul himself is said to be the 
writer, the time of action is not within the lifetime of Christ, 
as the appeal of Paul and Michael attests. 

^ Cf. p. 16, above (Egyptian judgment). 

** Cf. T. Wright, St. Patrick^s Purgatory, etc., p. 33, note. 



32 The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell, 

3. And as we were praying, there suddenly appeared two men 
standing before the Lord toward the East/ whom we could not 
look upon : for there came from their countenance a ray as of 
the sun, and all their raiment was light, such as never eye of 
man beheld, nor mouth can describe, nor heart conceive the glory 
wherewith they were clad, and the beauty of their countenance. 

"All their raiment was light," etc. Angels, and the blessed 
in general, are almost invariably represented as clad in garments 
of shining white. These betoken joy, so Gregory tells us.^ 

In the visions, the outward appearance of souls is often taken 
for an index of the degree of virtue which they possess. Just 
as the virtuous and blessed are clad in garments of spotless 
white, so the damned are robed in darkness. (Compare Sects, 
6, 15, below.) In St. Paul we have the characteristic black- 
clothed damsels.^ In Thurcill perfectly white souls are sent to 
heaven, spotted souls to purgatory,^ while the black souls are 
sent to purgatory or to hell as the balance of judgment decrees. 
The same feature, it will be remembered, occurs in 1 hespesius,^ 
In the Voyage of Maelduin, and in similar works modelled upon 
it, the travellers find dark-robed men on the fifteenth island. 

"Such as never eye beheld," etc. This is, no doubt, a para- 
phrase of II Cor., XII, 4 ; How that he was caught up into 
paradise, and heard unspeakable words, etc. The thought recurs 
frequently in the visions, in connection with both heaven and 
hell. Compare also Be Domes Dcege: 

>>a oferswi]7a^ sefan and sprsece 

manna gehwylces for micelnesse 

nsenig spraec maeg beon spellum areccan 

senigum on eor>an earmlice witu. — 1. 184 f. 

St Paul, Jesus Coll. MS., 1. 263 f. has the following : 

Hit is iwriten on the bok 
For witnesse ther-of ich tok, 

' Cf. Enoch, XXVII, 1. Also Drihthelm, Monk of Eynsham. 

^Homily XXIX : "In albis vestibus gaudium et solemnitas mentis ostenditur." 
Cf. A. S. aist, 1. 448 f. Daniel, vii, 9. 

•''Sect. 9. 

■^Spot and sin early became synonymous terms. Cf. A. S. womm; lat. maculare. 

^Cf. p. 28, above. Thespesius also differentiates souls by colors; p. 28, above. 
Also St. Patrick^ & Purgatory, sect. 11. 



The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell, 33 

Theyh on hundred heueden iseten 
Seoththe Kaym was bi-yeten ; 
And nyht and day heueden iwaked 
And teth and tange of stel imaked, 
And tolden of helle pyne o ; 
Yet ther beoth a thusend mo. 

3. (Cont'd). And when we saw them we were amazed : for 
their bodies were whiter than any snow, and redder than any 
rose, and the red thereof was mingled with the white, and, in 
a word, I cannot describe the beauty of them : for their hair 
was thick and curling and bright, and beautiful upon their face 
and shoulders, like a wreath woven of spikenard and bright 
flowers, or like a rainbow in the sky, such was their beauty. 

4. When, therefore, we saw their beauty, we were all amaze- 
ment at them, for they had appeared suddenly: and I came near 
to the Lord and said, "Who are these?" He saith to me: 
''These are your brethren, the righteous, whose forms ye wished 
to behold." And I said to Him : ''And where are all the 
righteous, or of what sort is the world wherein they are, and 
possess this glory?" 

The dialogue form between the visionary and his guide has 
been employed by almost all subsequent recounters, inclusive 
of Dante. 

5. And the Lord showed me a very great space outside this 
world, shining excessively with light, and the air that was there 
illuminated with the rays of the sun, and the earth itself bloom- 
ing with unfading flowers, and full of spices and fair-flowering 
plants, incorruptible and bearing a blessed fruit : and so strong 
was the perfume that it was borne even to us from thence. And 
the dwellers in that place were clad in the raiment of the angels 
of light, and their raiment was like their land : and angels ran 
about them there. And the glory of the dwellers there was 
equal, and with one voice they praised the Lord God, rejoicing 
in that place. The Lord saith unto us : " This is the place of 
your brethren, the righteous men." 

We have here an orthodox, though very brief, description of 
the abode of the blessed — a place of purely sensuous delights. 
The model for all such descriptions was probably the Book of 
Efaoch. The elaborate accounts of a happy otherworld which 
we find especially in the mythical voyages constitute a different 
3 



34 The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell, 

chapter of research.^ In the visions, the description of heaven 
became ever more and more subordinated to that of the torments 
of hell, until we often find accounts in which heaven is not 
mentioned at all.^ This is very natural. The description of 
heaven did not allow as free play to the imaginative and in- 
ventive faculties as did that of hell, nor did it serve the end 
in view as well. The fear of future torment was ever more 
efficacious in restraining from sin than was the hope of future 
bliss. This bliss, as has been said, consisted, in the minds of 
the visionaries, of purely sensuous delights : limitless space, 
excessive light and fragrance, incorruptible flowers and fruits. 
The more exalted and spiritual enjoyments were generally not 
dwelt upon: the clergy probably realized that they would not 
appeal to the popular understanding. 

A striking exception to this general rule is the Vision of 
Adamnany in which the description of heaven is very much fuller 
than in the general run of visions, being in close relation with 
the conceptions of a happy other world which we find in the 
voyages. In Adamnan's Vision we are told of a " kingdom 
without pride, without haughtiness, without falsehood, without 
blasphemy, without fraud, without pretence, without reddening, 
without blushing, without disgrace, without deceit, without envy, 
without pride, without disease, without sickness, without poverty, 
without nakedness, without destruction, without extinction, without 
hail, without snow, without wind, without wet, without noise, 
without thunder, without darkness, without coldness; — a king- 
dom noble, admirable, delightful, with fruitfulness, with light, 
with odor of a plenteous earth, wherein is delight of every 
goodness.''^ 

Compare with this, Blickling homily, viii,* where heaven is 
described as "the glorious life, wherein angels, and archangels, 

^For a complete study of the subject, cf. Nutt's essay, "The Happy Other 
World," in Meyer & Nutt's ed. of the Voyage of Bran. Also A. Graf, La Leg- 
genda del Paradiso Terrestre, Torino, 1878. For a complete historical study of 
the Land of Cockaigne legend, cf. Poeschel, Paul & Braune's Beiirdge V, p. 389 f. 

' In the early centuries of our era, on the other hand, heaven often received 
the preference. Thus, the well-known Vision of St. Sauve makes no mention 
of hell. 

^ Cf Meyer and Nutt, lac. cit., p. 222 f. * Ed. Morris, i, p. 102. 



The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell. 35 

and patriarchs, and prophets, and all the sanctified, abide in the 
presence of the Lord, where is eternal joy without sadness, youth 
without age ; where is no grief nor toil, nor any uneasiness, 
nor sorrow, nor weeping, nor hunger, nor thirst, nor ache, nor 
ill ; where no man will meet his enemy, nor leave his friend, 
but there may he, who shall visit that place, dwell peacefully 
with angels in eternal joy before our Lord, who liveth and 
reigneth with God our Father, and with the Holy Ghost 
without end." 

6. And I saw another place over against that other, very 
squalid, and it was a place of chastisement ; and those that were 
being chastised, and the angels that were chastising, tad their 
raiment dark, according to the atmosphere of the place. 

We have here a comparatively definite mention of the position 
of hell, " over against that other." The relative positions of 
the Mohammedan abodes of joy and punishment are similar.^ 
The belief that hell and purgatory were situated in the centre 
of the earth, though clearly implied in both the Old and the 
New Testaments, did not become general until considerably 
later. The Anglo-Saxons so conceived of it, as the vocabulary 
testifies. 

The chastisers in this paragraph are called angels. In section 

12 they are termed "evil spirits;" an identification, in the 

writer's mind, of the fallen angels as the instruments of divine 

justice, and as the enemies of God. Only in the later accounts 

are the evil spirits themselves made to undergo torment. 

7. And there were some there hanging by their tongues, and 
these were they that blaspheme the way of righteousness : and 
there was beneath them fire flaming and tormenting them. 

Suspension by various portions of the body, according to the 
nature of the crime, is a feature particularly of the visions of 
JSt. Paul and Albericy and of St, PatricMs Purgatory. In the 
oase of the first two, which seem to have been modelled directly 
upon the Petrine Apocalypse (as will be shown more fully later), 
the sinful souls are suspended from the branches of burning 

» Cf. p. 18, above. 



36 The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell, 

(sword-leaved) trees/ I think it, therefore, safe to conclude that 
our fragment is here somewhat corrupt, and that the burning 
trees — or some equivalent — were originally a part of it. The state- 
ment, as we have it in this paragraph, is very abrupt, comings 
as it does, immediately upon the general description of hell. 
Moreover, the writer says, " some were hanging by their tongues,^'^ 
from which it would seem that we must infer that others were 
hanging from other members, which is, of course, borne out by 
St. PauVs Vision? Hence it may be presumed that at least one 
paragraph has been lost between sections 6 and 7. 

^^ These were they that blaspheme,^' etc. In the Apocalypse 
of Peter the principle of according punishments suitable to the 
crimes is rigidly observed.^ Blasphemers are suspended by their 
tongues ; adulterous women are punished together with their 
partners in crime (9) ; murderers are devoured by reptiles whilst 
their victims look upon their agony (10); evil-speakers and false 
witnesses gnaw their lips and tongues (13, 14), etc. Subsequent 
accounts become more and more lax in this respect, until finally 
almost any punishment is made to fit any crime. Dante, of 
course, is very careful in this particular. The Greek, and many 
of the Latin versions of the Vision of St. Paul observe the 
rule, but in the popular accounts much freedom exists. Compare^ 
for example, the following from the Vernon MS. : 

. . . anothur derk place 
Moni men and wymmen ther amongus, 
That for-freten heore owne tongus : 



Thei usuden ocur and usuri, 
Merciable weore thei nouht, 
Therfore hit schal be dere a-bouht. 



Why usurers should be punished by having to gnaw their own 
tongues is not clear. In the Apocalypse, false witnesses are 
very appropriately punished in a way similar to this. 

When we come to the accounts of the twelfth and thirteenth 
centuries, when visions were at the height of their glory, we find 

' Cf. also p. 14, above. 
; ^The trees do not, to be sure, occur in the earliest Greek version of Pauty 
but spring up in the earliest Latin texts. 

' Cf. also p. 25, above. 



The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell. 37 

the utmost nonchalance observed in the pairing off of punish- 
ments and crimes. The Vision of Tundale, the acme of popular 
visions, in which the most horrible torments are lovingly dwelt 
upon with the zest of an epicure in torture, offends most flagrantly 
in this particular. 

8. And there was a certain lake full of flaming mire, wherein 
were certain men that pervert righteousness ; and tormenting 
angels were set upon them. 

The burning lake or river, corresponding in a general way 
to Acheron or Styx, is one of the commonest features of all. 
Oriental as well as Christian, accounts of hell. We have en- 
countered burning rivers in the Book of Enoch. The lakes are 
more often full of molten metal or sulphur than of mire, as 
here. Dante's lake of mire will at once suggest itself. A " burn- 
ing lake" is also mentioned in Revelation. Representative visions 
in which burning lakes or rivers occur are : Thespesius, St. Paul, 
Monk of Wenlok, Wettin, Charles the Fat, Alberic, Timdale, Monk 
of Eynsham, St. Patrick's Purgatory , Thurcill and Lazarus. Dante, 
of course, has it. In a large number of these and other accounts 
the flood is spanned by the well-known bridge,^ which, strange 
to say, Dante has omitted, probably because it did not work 
well into his system.^ 

9. And there were also others, women, hung by their hair 
over that mire that bubbled up : and these were they that had 
adorned themselves for adultery: and the men that had been 
joined with them in the defilement of adultery were hanging by 
their feet, and had their heads in the mire : and all were saying, 
" We believed not that we should come into this place.'' 

Punishing adulterous women together with their partners in 
crime is occasionally but not frequently met with in the later 
visions. In St. Paul, Vernon MS., 1. 72, we have : 

Byndeth hem in knucchenes, forthi 
To brenne lyk to licche, 
Spous-brekers with lechours, 
Rauisschours with rauisschours. . . . 

^Cf.p. 17 f., above. 

^ Dante has several bridges, of course, but they are not a part of the system 
of torment. 



38 The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell, 

Douce MS. is a little closer — " bind . . . cursid leuers with here 
cumpers." The thought is echoed by Aelfric.^ In Thurcill, 
adulterous men and women are among the performers in the 
infernal theatre,^ and in the Vision of Wettin adulterous ecclesi- 
astics are immersed into the fiery flood ''ad loca genitalium/^ 
with their partners in crime opposite them. The Vision of 
Alheric presents the closest parallel to the Apocalypse,^ 

10. And I saw the murderers and them that had conspired 
with them cast into a certain narrow place full of evil reptiles, 
and being smitten by those beasts, and wallowing there in that 
torment: and there were set upon them worms, as it were, ia 
clouds of darkness. And the souls of them that had been 
murdered were standing and looking upon the punishment of 
those murderers, and saying, "O God, righteous is thy judgment! 



yy 



Confronting sinners with the victims of their crimes is a 
feature of the Apocalypse of Peter. (Compare next section.) 
It is not common in the visions, and we do not find it in SU 
PauUs. In the Vision of Alberic, homicides are placed in a 
lake of blood, and the murderer has for three years to carry, 
attached to his neck, a demon in the form of his victim. It re- 
calls Dante's account.^ We find something similar in the late 
Oriental descriptions of hell. 

Serpents and kindred animals, as a mode of torment, occur 
universally. 

11. And hard by that place I saw another narrow place, wherein 
the gore and the filth of those that were tormented ran down, 
and became, as it were, a lake there. And there sat women 
having the gore up to their throats, and over against them a 
multitude of children that were born out of due time sat crying : 
and there proceeded from them flames of fire, and smote the 
women upon the eyes. And these were they that had destroyed 
their children and caused abortion. 

Different degrees of immersion in fire, ice or filth is a common 
feature, and is found especially in the visions of St. Paul, Wettin, 
Charles the Fat, Alheric, St. Patricio's Purgatory and Lazarus, 

1 Thorpe, i, 527. Cf. also ii, 2 (b), below. 

•Sect. 8 (e). ^ Cf. p. 43, below. * Inferno^ xxxii. 



The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell, 39 

In Alheric, souls are plunged into ice. Compare Dante, Inferno^ 
XXXII, in which murderers are plunged into the frozen lake 
up to their throats. 

Unbaptized children, even those who died the moment they 
were born (Tundale), are often made to undergo a certain amount 
of punishment. In the Vision of AlheriCj the first thing the 
visionary beholds is a large enclosure filled with very young 
children who had not been baptized. 

The punishment for the crime of abortion is very much elabo- 
rated in the Vision of St. Paul} 

12. And there were other men and women on fire up to their 
middle and cast into a dark place, and scourged by evil spirits, 
and having their entrails devoured by worms that rested not: 
and these were they that persecuted the righteous and delivered 
them up. 

The punishment here does not seem very appropriate to the 
crime. Immersion to the middle is most commonly the punish- 
ment of adulterers. Compare St. Paii^, Vernon MS., 1.102 f.: 

And tho that to the navel thou se 
Spous-brekers and lechours thei be. . . . 

Compare further note to sect. 9, above. 

13. And hard by them again were women and men gnawing 
their lips, and being tormented, and receiving red-hot iron upon 
their eyes : and these were they that had blasphemed and spoken 
evil of the way of righteousness. 

14. And over against these were again other men and women 
gnawing their tongues and having flaming fire in their mouths : 
and these were the false witnesses. 

This incident occurs in just this form in the Vision of St. Paul, 
Vernon MS., 1. 121 f.: 

Moni men and wymmen ther amongus, 
That for-freten heore owne tongus. . . . 

though the punishment is not, as has been said, appropriate to 
the crime for which it is inflicted. 

1 Vernon, 1. 1 30 f. Sect. 9, below. 



40 The Medieval Visions of Heaven and HelL 

This is not a very striking feature, and therefore recurs only 
very seldom in later visions. 

^^ Having flaming fire in their mouths '^ recalls the similar 
feature of the Buddhist system/ where the damned are tormented 
by the flame having entered into them by the nine openings 
of the body. 

15. And in a certain other place were pebbles, sharper than 
swords, or than any spit, red-hot, and women and men, clad 
in filthy rags, were rolling upon them in torment : and these 
were the wealthy that had trusted in their wealth, and had not 
had pity on orphans and widows, but had neglected the com- 
mandment of God. 

This feature, with various modifications or elaborations, is a 
common one throughout the visions. It is very possibly of 
Oriental origin. Compare the Buddhist account,^ for example, 
where the damned are tormented by being fixed on red-hot iron 
pins, fastened to a floor of the same temperature and metal. 

The sharp pebbles also recur in various shapes all through 
the vision-literature. In the Vision of Tundale, they are one 
of the terrors of the bridge.^ In that of Alberic,'^ they appear 
as thorns. 

The filthy rags recall the black-garmented maidens of St, 
Paul's Vision. 

''And had not pity upon orphans," etc. In the Vision of 
AlberiCy^ women who had refused to foster little orphaned children 
are suspended from trees, and their breasts are constantly sucked 
dry by serpents. 

16. And in another great lake full of pitch and blood and 
boiling mire stood men and women up to their knees : and these 
were they that lent money and demanded interest on interest. 

From this paragraph we gain stylistic evidence, so to say, of 
the early date of composition of the Apocalypse of Peter. It is 
the third time that the lake of boiling mire has been called into 
requisition. The medieval vision- writers would never have been 
guilty of such a procedure. Their difficulty lay not in the dearth 

1 Cf. Fourth Budd. hell, p. 12, above. * qy sj^th Budd. hell, p. 12, above. 
3 Sect. 8. * P. 45, below. ^ P. 43, below. 



The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell. 41 

of torments — they had a superabundance of them : their trouble 
consisted in tlie necessity of inventing a commensurate number 
of crimes. Hence it often happens that the same crime is 
punished in a variety of ways. 

In the Vision of St. Paul, backbiters are immersed to their 
knees, whereas usurers, it will be remembered, gnawed their 
own tongues. 

17. And there were other men and women being hurled down 
from a great cliflP, and they reached the bottom and again were 
driven by those that were set upon them to climb up upon 
the cliff, and thence they were hurled down again, and they 
had no rest from this torment. 

The cliff is probably of Oriental origin. Compare the sixth 
Buddhist hell : They will be tumbled down headlong from a 
lofty burning mountain, etc. 

Cliffs or mountains occur in several visions, notably those of 
the Monk of Wenlok, Wetting Drihthelm and Alberic. They are 
not mentioned in St. Paulas. 

The last three sections of our fragment offer only very sporadic 
analogues to vision-literature. I add them for the sake of 
completeness. 

18. And beside that cliff was a place full of much fire, and 
there stood men who had made for themselves images instead 
of God, with their own hands. 

19. And beside them were other men and women, who had 
rods, smiting each other, and never resting from this manner 
of torment. 

The infliction of torment by the souls upon each other is 
rarely met with in later accounts. Of course, it at once recalls 
Dante, Inferno, Canto vii. Murderers, as has been said, are 
often tormented by their victims; also unnatural mothers by 
their offspring. 

20. And others again, near them, women and men, were burn- 
ing, and turning themselves and being roasted : and these were 
they that had forsaken the way of God. 



42 The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell, 

Summary of Principal Analogues. 

The incidents adduced in the following sections of the Apoca- 
lypse of Peter are repeated, occasionally with slight variations, in — 

1. Vision of St. Paul, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16. 

2. SL Patrick's Purgatory, 7, 8, 9, 10, 12, 16. 

3. Vision of Alberic, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 16, (17). 

4. Vision of Weitin, 8, 12, (17). 

5. Vision of Charles the Fat, 8, 12. 

It will be seen from this table that the principal incidents of 
the Apocalypse of Peter have been incorporated into the Vision 
of St. Paul. Whether the additions in the Latin versions of 
the latter work originally existed in that part of the Petrine 
vision which is lost to us, or whether the writer of the Pauline 
vision added them on his own account, cannot, of course, be 
decided. Certain it is, I think, that the later work was written 
upon the direct model of the earlier, and that these two oldest 
Christian visions are thus organically connected. And thus we 
have another link of the composite chain of vision-development 
established. 

The Apocalypse of Esdras^ and that of the Virgin — both of 
considerably later date than the Vision of St. Paul — need be 
given only passing notice, since their influence on subsequent 
apocalyptic literature was probably very slight. They themselves 
seem to have been modelled on the visions of Peter and Paul.^ 

Turning, therefore, at once to the medieval visions, to the 
twelfth century, when they began to flourish in all their power, 
we find two works in particular which have a comparatively 
large number of direct points of affinity with the Petrine vision. 
These are St. Patrick's Purgatory and the Vision of Alberic, 
The former need not be taken into consideration, since there 
can be no question of any immediate connection between it and 
Peter. The direct model for St. Patrick's Purgatory was pretty 
certainly some version of St. Paul's vision, and the points of 
resemblance which we find between it and the Apocalypse of 
Peter are only such as occur also in that of St. Paul. 

^ Tischendorf, Apocall. Apocr., 24-33. ' Cf. Mr. James' essay, be. cit., p. 69. 



The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell. 43 

But with the Vision of Alberic the case is different. The fol- 
lowing is a brief abstract of this vision, already discussed in 
another connection.^ 

Toward the beginning of the twelfth century, in a castle called 
the Castle of the Seven Brothers, Alberic, the son of the lord 
of the castle, remained nine entire days in a condition of uncon- 
sciousness. It was while in this state that, at the age of eight 
years, he had the following vision (which is related in the first 
person) : 

*^A bird of white plumage,^ like a dove, gently placed its 
beak into my mouth. I felt that he drew something thence, 
I knew not what. Then, seizing me by the hair, he raised me 
up into space. Soon the Apostle Peter appeared, accompanied 
by two angels, and they conducted me to the place where evil- 
doers undergo their punishments. 

^' I saw first a vast circle in which was a multitude of very 
young children in the midst of burning mists. St. Peter told 
me it was here that those whom death had stricken before 
baptism were purified. Then the apostle directed my attention 
to a terrible valley filled with innumerable mountains of ice, 
the summits of which the eye could scarcely see. In the ice 
were tormented many souls : some were in it up to their knees, 
others to their middles, and still others to their breasts, according 
to the gravity of their crimes. A few, plunged in headforemost, 
had only their legs protruding. St. Peter informed me that these 
were such as had committed rape, adultery or incest. 

"We next passed into another valley, not less horrible, full 
of trees Avith sword-like branches,^ from which were suspended- 
women whose breasts were being constantly sucked dry by 
serpents. These were women who had refused to foster little 
orphaned children. 

" I also saw in the same valley still other women suspended 
from trees by their hair, with flames beneath them ; and these, 
I was told, were those who had indulged in unlawful loves. 

" Further on there was a ladder of white-hot iron, of immense 
height, covered with spikes. Those who were forced to ascend 

1 P. 6 f., above. » Cf. Ps. cxxiv, 7. ' C/. p. 14, above. 



44 The Medieval Visions of Heaven and HelL. 

it soon fell, and were engulfed in a vast lake of burning oil 
and rosin. ^ Thus, the apostle told me, were punished those 
who had not restrained their fleshly appetites on Sundays, holy 
days and fast days ; for it is absolutely necessary to deny oneself 
all carnal pleasures on these days, and to consecrate them to 
works of charity. 

^' I was then conducted to a great lake, filled, as it seemed 
to me, with blood ; but my guide told me it was fire, into 
which homicides and tyrants were plunged. For three years the 
murderer was forced to carry upon his neck a demon in the 
form of his victim, after which he was hurled into the lake. 

"We finally arrived at the very mouth of the infernal chasm, 
resembling a vast pit. The eye could not pierce the darkness ; 
a terrible odor and frightful lamentations proceeded from it. 
At the entrance was chained an enormous and hideous two- 
headed serpent. Before one of its mouths was an infinite multi- 
tude of souls, whom the monster inhaled like flies, disgorging 
them again from the other mouth in the form of burning embers. 

"I next saw a lake of liquid metal, from which issued jets 
of flame, which consumed the sacrilegious, and such as had 
practised simony. 

" The apostle next conducted me to a sea of sulphurous fire, 
in which a multitude of souls were wallowing, tormented by 
serpents with which demons struck their faces. These were false 
witnesses. 

" Through the middle of the plain, where I now found myself, 
flowed a burning river. Across it was thrown a bridge of iron, 
very broad at first, but as narrow as a simple thread toward 
the centre. The less sinful a soul, the greater the lapidity 
with which it crossed the bridge. The more sinful ones, upon 
reaching the centre, fell into the boiling flood below. Demons 
drew them out and replaced them upon the bridge, whence they 
again fell, and so on until purged of their crimes, when they 
could cross the bridge with ease. This, the apostle told me, 
was the Bridge of Purgatory. 

"Continuing upon our way, we arrived at a valley which, 
my guide informed me, it required three days and nights to 

^ This incident would seem to be a variation upon the bridge-theme. 



The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell. 46 

traverse. It was so strewn with thorns and obstructions that 
the foot left no mark upon it. I saw a demon mounted upon 
an immense dragon, and brandishing a hideous serpent in his 
hand. As soon as a soul arrived in this valley, the demon pur- 
sued it across the country, continually scourging it with the 
serpent. When this punishment had continued until the soul 
was cleansed of its crimes by grief, it then acquired the airiness 
necessary to permit it to escape from the pursuit of the monster. 
The souls then entered a flourishing country, exhaling the 
sweetest perfumes, where its limbs, torn by the thorns, are 
healed of their wounds. 

"The souls of the just who dwell here, enjoying blessed 
repose, welcome the new arrival, and congratulate him upon 
having escaped the common enemy.'' 

Then follows an orthodox description of the sensuous delights 
of the happy other-world, in this, as in most visions, very brief. 
In the centre is situated paradise, which these happy souls will 
enter at the last judgment. 

" St. Peter,'' says Alberic, in conclusion, " showed me a great 
many other marvelous things, and gave me useful advice, which 
he ordered me to communicate to men upon my return to 
earth." 

This vision is remarkable in several respects. In the first 
place, the visionary is a child of eight years. (Compare also 
the Vision of William.) This was probably done advisedly by 
the monk or monks who wrote and spread this vision, and who 
realized that a vision of this nature, vouchsafed an unsophisti- 
cated child, would appear all the more marvelous and convincing 
to the credulous public. 

The many striking analogues to Dante's poem are evident, 
and some of them have already been pointed out by Delepierre.^ 
They are briefly the following ; 

Alberic : " In the ice were plunged many souls. ... A few, 
plunged in headforemost, had only their legs protruding." 
Dantey Inf., xix, 13 f. : 

^lAv. des Vis.y ii, p. 44 f. 



46 The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell. 

lo vidi per le coste e per lo fondo 
Piena la pietra livida di fori 
D'un largo tutti, e ciascuno era tondo. 



Fuor della bocca a ciascun soperchiava 
D'un peccator li piedi, e delle gambe 
Infino al grosso ; e I'altro dentro stava. 

Alheric: "I was then conducted to a great lake of blood," etc. 
Dantey Inf.y xii, 46 f. : 

Ma ficcia gli occhi a valle, che s'approcia 
La riviera dal sangue, in la qual boUe 
Qual che per violenza in altrui noccia. 

Compare also /n/*., xxx, 11 f., already pointed out, in which 
the punishment of Ugolino's murderer is recorded. 

Alheric: "At the entrance was chained an " enormous and 
hideous two-headed serpent, inhaling souls like flies." 

Dante^s Cerberus devours a sinful soul " a guisa di mociulla." 
Compare also Vision of Tundale^ sect. 13, below. 

Alheric: "A lake of liquid metal : simony." 
Dante, Inf., xix, 1 f. : 

O Simon Mago, O miseri seguaci, 

Che le cose di Dio, che di bontate 

Deono essere spose, voi rapaci 

Per oro a per argento adulterate. . . . 

Alheric: "Demon mounted upon a dragon, pursuing souls, 
and lashing them with serpents." 
Dante y Inf., xxv, 16 f. : 

Quei si fuggi che non parlo piu verbo ; 

Ed io vidi un Centauro pien di rabbia 

Venir chiamando : " Ov' e, ov' e I'acerbo ? " 
Maremma non cred' io che tante n'abbia 

Quante biscie egli avea su per la groppa, 

Infin dove comincia nostra labbia. 
Sopra le spalle dietro dalla coppa, 

Con I'ale aperte gli giacea un draco ; 

E quello afibca qualunque s'intoppa. 



The Medieval Visiotis of Heaven and Hell. 47 

This is certainly a very striking parallel. An incident some- 
what similar to this we found in the Vision of ThespesiuSj p. 50, 
above. Compare also the vision of the Monk of Eynsham, sect. 
6, below. The following episode, similar to the above in that 
the souls pursue each other, occurs in the Old French poem, 
Floire et Blancejlor : ^ 

La ou est Dido et Biblis 

Qui por amor furent ocis, 

Qui par enfer vont duel faisant 

Et lor drus en dolor querant: 

Eles les quierent et querront 

Toujours, ne ja n'es troveront, etc. 

Further parallels in Old French romances might be cited. Other 
general similarities in Dante's work to the Vision of Alheric are 
self-evident. 

The most striking analogues in Alberic to visions other than 
those of Peter and Paul are, in addition to such as have already 
been instanced, the following : 

1. Alberic has three guides, Peter and two angels. This is 
unusual, and recalls the Vision of FurseuSy who is raised aloft 
by two angels, preceded by a third. 

2. Peter is very rarely the guide. In the Vision of Ansgar, 
Peter and John officiate. 

3. The burning ladder occurs in a sermon of Gregory VII. 

4. Lashing with serpents occurs in several accounts. 

A more detailed comparison between the visions of Peter^ 
Paul, and Alberic may now be attempted. The features common 
to all three are : 

1. Different degrees of immersion according to the nature of 
the crime. 

2. Suspension from various portions of the body. 

3. The burning lake. 

4. The flood with serpents. 

The incidents common to Paul and Alberic, as against Peter , are : 

^Bihl. Eizevirienne, p. 34. The feature is omitted in the Middle-English 
version of the poem. 



48 The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell, 

1. The burning trees.^ >, 

2. The pits with terrible stench. 

3. The bridge.^ 

The features common to Peter and Alheric, as against Paul, are: 

1. The enclosure filled with young children. 

2. Adulterous women hung up by their hair. 

3. Lake of blood. 

It is hardly possible that the Vision of Alheric was modelled 
upon that of Paul. Too many of the most striking features of 
the latter are omitted in the later work — the burning caldron, 
the seven pains, the burning wheel, the black-clad maidens. 
Alheric, it will be seen from the above, has but seven points 
in common with Paul, while it has just as many equally striking 
ones in common with the Petrine vision, which is only a fragment. 
Moreover, Peter is expressly mentioned as the guide in Alberic, 
showing that the writer had that saint's vision in mind when 
he wrote. Paul is not mentioned, nor John, nor the Archangel 
Michael. If they were, the mention of Peter would have no 
special significance, for we should then merely have a catalogue 
of the personages most closely associated, in the minds of men, 
with the other world. Such catalogues do, as a matter of fact, 
often occur. But in the Vision of Alheric, St. Peter has been 
selected in preference to any other more famous other-world 
visitor. 

Then, too, it must be borne in mind that the short Apocalypse 
of Peter which we possess may be but a small and corrupt 
fragment of the whole work, and this easily explains away the 
points which Paul and Alheric have in common as against Peter, 
But it is just as reasonable to suppose that these features, being 
widely current in late medieval times, and common property of 
all vision-writers, were appropriated, quite independently of one 
another, by the late revisers of the Pauline vision, and the com- 
posers of that of Alberic. The only feature which offers any 
difficulties from this point of view is that of the burning trees ; 
and these, as I have already pointed out, we have every reason 
to believe occurred in the original version of the Apocalypse 
of Peter, 

^ Neither of these features are found in the Greek version of St. PauVs Vision. 



The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell. 49 

It seems to me necessary, therefore, to suppose that the Petrine 
vision was known as such as late as the twelfth century. 
No doubt it had received many additions and modifications. 
Possibly a unique manuscript was possessed by the monks of 
Mt. Oassin, who wrote up the Vision of Alberic. Possibly there 
are other manuscripts of the Apocalypse still hidden away in 
the recesses of some cloister library. In any case, it seems 
evident that the Vision of Alberic was modelled directly upon 
it — either immediately from a manuscript or through the medium 
of some now forgotten church father. 

In this way we again connect the Divina Commedia with the 
earliest Christian vision of a popular nature which we possess. 
The Vision of Alberic was one of the best-known and most 
popular accounts of the time, and its influence, together with 
that of the Vision of St. Paul, is traceable in many of the latest 
visions. As an example, the fifteenth century Vision of LazaruSy 
already referred to, will serve. Here proud men are attached 
to wheels with hooks, whirling incessantly — the wheel of St. 
PauFs vision. Envious men are placed to the navel in a flood 
frozen as ice — immediately copied from the Vision of Alberic, 
Angry men are placed on butchers' tables and slaughtered ; 
slothful souls are in a dark hall full of serpents ; the covetous 
are placed in kettles of boiling lead and oil ; gluttons, in a 
stinking, venomous, toad-filled flood, the waters of which they 
are forced to drink ; the incontinent are punished in a field full 
of deep pits, with fire and sulphur — almost all of which features 
recall the visions of St. Paul or Alberic. 

After the thirteenth century, the influence of Dante's work 
must, of course, be taken into consideration. 



II. THE VISIONS IN ANGLO-SAXON LITERATURE. 

1. Visions Recounted by Bede. 

The authority which Bede enjoyed in England throughout 

the Middle Ages, and the unquestioning and reverent credulity 

which was accorded all his utterances, make his work a most 

important factor in a study like the present. It was through 

4 



60 The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell. 

the medium of Bede's writings that some of the most important 
patristic doctrines found their way into England. In particular, 
Bede was the first to promulgate a definite doctrine on purgatory 
on English soil. In short, he was for England much what 
Gregory the Great had been for continental Europe. We know 
how widely-spread the visions which Gregory tells of became 
on the continent, and it will be seen that those which Bede 
recounts had an even greater influence upon subsequent vision- 
literature in England. Whence Bede himself derived the material 
for his accounts is another, and a quite unanswerable question. 
The Vision of Furseus is easily accounted for. This holy man 
spent the greater part of his early life in France, and, while 
there, no doubt became imbued wilh the orthodox patristic doc- 
trines and conceptions. But this vision is not original with 
Bede. Neither, to be sure, is that of Drihthelm, if we are to 
accredit Bedels own statements ; but Drihthelm^ vision is related 
with all the careful regard for detail which is characteristic of 
the continental visions, and it is, therefore, highly probable that 
the historian elaborated this story, as it was told him, from his 
own readings. The question is not an important one. The ab- 
stract of the Vision of Drihthelm^ given below, will show very 
plainl}? that but very few, if any, of its features originated in 
England. 

The Vision of Furseus^ is about the earliest English vision 
we possess, and it is principally in this fact that its interest 
and importance for our study lies. Its influence on later visions 
was slight, and its details are not particularly striking. 

Furseus, Bede tells us, came out of Ireland into the province 
of the East Saxons during the reign of Sigebert. He was re- 
nowned both for his words and for his actions, and '' remarkable 
for singular virtues, being desirous to live a stranger for our 
Lord whenever an opportunity should ofl*er." On coming into 
England he was honorably received, and succeeded in converting 
many unbelievers to Christ. Being encouraged in a vision to 

^Hist. EccL, III. Aelfric, Thorpe, ii. For complete life of Furseus, cf. Ada 
Sand Bolland, 16 January, p. 413 f. Cap. I and U recount early life in France; 
Cap. Ill, sojourn in England; Cap. IV and V, return to, and death in, France; 
Cap. VI, miracles after death ; epilogue and life as related by Bede. 



^mm 



The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell, 51 

continue the work he had undertaken, he built a monastery, 
which was afterwards much embellished by King Anna and 
his nobles. 

Furseus was of " noble Scottish blood/^ ^ but much more noble 
in mind than in birth, having from his earliest years particularly 
applied himself to reading sacred books, and following monastic 
•discipline. 

One day he fell into a trance at his monastery, and leaving 
his body from the evening till the cock crew, ^ he was found 
worthy to behold the choirs of angels, and to hear the praises 
which are sung in heaven. 

Three days later he had another vision, not only of the greater 
joys of heaven, but also of the state of sinful souls. He was 
guided by three angels,^ one of whom preceded, while the other 
two defended him from the perils of the way. He was attacked 
by evil spirits, who were driven away by the angels.^ The devils 
advanced as arguments against him all his deeds, superfluous 
words, and even thoughts,^ but were answered and defeated by 
the angels.^ He was next lifted on high, and being told to look 
back, beheld a dark valley beneath him, in which were four 
:fires not far distant from each other. These fires were, re- 
spectively, falsehood, covetousness, discord and iniquity, and 
they will kindle and consume the world. These fires, increasing 
by degrees, extended so as to meet one another, and, being 
joined, became one immense flame. This, the angel tells Fur- 
seus, " tries every man according to the merits of his works ; 
for every man's concupiscence shall burn in the fire; for, as 
everyone burns in the body through unlawful pleasure, so, when 
discharged of the body, he shall burn in the punishment which 
he has deserved."^ 

^ " De genere Scottorum," i. e., Irish. 

* The time of duration of visions varies greatly. Three days is the favorite 
period. 

' Cf. Alberic, p. 47, above. * Cf. Tundale, Dante. * Cf. p. 15, above. 

^Perhaps we have here an early intimation of the belief, common in the 
Middle Ages, that an individual's good and evil angels contend for his soul 
after death. Cf. Grimm, Mythology, p. 796 f. 

'This is evidently the purgatorial fire of the judgment day which we find 
in the Anglo-Saxon poets. 



62 The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell. 

The guidiog angel then divided the flame, and they passed 
through. Furseus saw devils flying through the fire. He was 
vouchsafed a more extended view of the heavenly troops, after 
which they retraced their steps, the angel again dividing the 
flame. But this time Furseus does not escape unscathed, for the 
demons, seizing one whom they were tormenting in the flame^ 
threw him at Furseus, and, touching his shoulder and arm^ 
burned them. From this man Furseus had received a garment 
when he died. Hereupon follows a lively dispute between the 
good and evil spirits as to the extent of Furseus^s guilt, incurred 
by this act. The good angels are of course victorious. After 
this Furseus returned to his body, and it was said that, when 
relating these visions, though it was winter weather and a hard 
frost, and he was sitting in a thin garment, yet he sweated as 
if it had been in the greatest heat of summer. 

This vision lacks entirely the dominant characteristics of the 
large majority of similar works. The vision of heaven is fairly 
well developed, but there is practically no vision whatever of 
hell. It is rather a forecast, bordering upon the allegorical, of 
the judgment day. Two points, however, we gain by it for 
England — the '^trance form,'^ that is, falling sick and remaiuing^ 
unconscious for a given length of time, and the guide. 

The Vision of Drihthelm is of greater importance to our study,^ 
since it possesses all the essentials of a late medieval work.. 
Many features of the subsequent English and Irish visions can 
be traced back to it,^ and it may therefore be considered the 
bond which linked perhaps more than any other single work, 
with the possible exception of St. PauVs Vision, the continental 
stories with those of England. It is, furthermore, particularly 
interesting, in that it makes specific mention of purgatory as a 
place of probation, as distinguished from hell, whence there is^ 
no release. Nowhere else throughout Anglo-Saxon literature,, 
outside of Bede, is this doctrine advanced. The closest approach 
to it is the purgatorial fire of the judgment day — a conception 
derived immediately from the Bible. 

* In the Vision of the Monk of Eynsham, for example, we seem to have direct 
borrowing from Drihthelm. 



The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell. 53 

The following is a brief abstract of the Vision of Drihthelm. 
Analogies to earlier and later works will be indicated in the 
foot-notes, showing, wherever it is possible to do so, the ultimate 
source of the incidents and the subsequent use made of them. 
The resemblances to the Book of Enoch and to the Vision of 
Thespesius are especially significant. (When the origin and 
history of a feature has already been traced elsewhere, reference 
will merely be made to the passage in which the point was first 
treated.) 

When his soul left his body, Drihthelm was led by his guide,^ 
toward the north-east.*^ This guide had a shining countenance 
and a bright garment.^ They first came to a valley of great 
breadth and depth,^ and of infinite length .° On the left it was 
full of dreadful flames ; on the right, violent hail, wind and 
enow held sway. The souls, seeking relief alternately from the 
one or the other torment, constantly oscillated between them.® 
But this was not hell.^ 

As they proceeded, the place suddenly became dark, and 
finally the obscurity became so dense that Drihthelm could dis- 
tinguish nothing but the shape of his guide's garment.^ "As we 
went on through the shades of night, on a sudden there appeared 
before us frequent globes of black flames,^ rising, as it were, out 
of a great pit, and falling back again into the same." Drihthelm 
observes that the flames are full of souls ; ^^ a terrible stench 
proceeds from the flames. 

Here his guide suddenly leaves him,^^ and Drihthelm hears 
behind him the noise of mingled lamentations and laughter, the 
latter proceeding from demons, the former from a monk, a lay- 
man, and a woman, who are being hurled into the pit. In the 

^Apoc. of Peter, 2. ^Enoch, xxvii. Also Apoc. of Peter, 3. 

^Apoc. of Peter, 3. 

* Enoch, Liii, 1. Throughout vision-literature. Of. especially Monk of 
Eynsham, sect. 5. 

* Concerning size of hell, etc., cf. p. 23, note. 
' Cf. p. 1 1, above. Also Tundale, sect. 5. 

^ Paul's and Tundale's guides constantly tell them that worse things are still 
to come. 

® Cf. Tundale, sect. 4. St. Patricks Purgatory, sect. 3. 

^Anglo-Saxon hell, p. 60, below. ^° Cf. Thespesius, p. 27, above. 

"/6id., p. 28. Also Tundale. 



64 The Medieval Visions of Heaven and HelL 

meantime some of the demons, with glaring eyes, and vomiting 
stinking fire from their mouths and nostrils, attack Drihthelm, 
and threaten to lay hold on him with burning tongs. While 
thus perilously situated, he sees a bright star approaching, which 
proves to be his guide, who puts the demons to flight.^ 

Going to the south-east, Drihthelm is led out of hell to the 
abodes of the blessed. 

» 

Further borrowings from Drihthelm in the' later English 
visions will be indicated in the special treatment of those works. 

The Vision of Drihthelm is related in Book V, chapter 12, of 
the Ecclesiastical History. Bede adduces two other short visions 
in the same work, but they are of a very general character, and 
need not, therefore, be considered here. Compare Hist. EccL, 
V, 14; V, 13. 

2. The Anglo-Saxon Hell. 
(a) The Poets. 

The Anglo-Saxon poets, especially Cynewulf and his school, 
have given us, in scattered passages throughout their works, a 
brief description of hell as they conceived it ; and by a collation 
of these we are enabled to obtain a fairly satisfactory basis for 
comparison with the conceptions of the vision-writers. That there 
is a close connection between the two branches, there can, I think, 
be no doubt. 

Waller Deering, in his dissertation,^ makes a brief study of 
the descriptions of hell found in the works of the Anglo-Saxon 
poets, and from them attempts to arrive at independent results 
for Anglo-Saxon. Regarding the sources of these conceptions, 
he says, p. 57 : " In no feature of our subject have we found 
such a mixture of different and contradictory conceptions. But, 
strange as they may seem at first sight, they should not sur- 
prise us. When we go back to the sources of these conceptions, 
and notice how the poets' general idea of hell was gradually 
developed from a union of very different elements, each with 

^ Tundale, sect. 3. 

'^ The Anglo-Saxon Poets on the Judgment Day, Halle, 1890. 



The Medieval Vismis of Heaven and Hell. 66 

strong influence on the whole, these contradictions appear quite 
natural. Some of the features involved seem taken directly from 
the Bible, though perhaps generally indirectly, through Christian 
tradition. . . . These Bible teachings, as they had become cur- 
rent Christian tradition, and been learned and remembered by 
the poets, are doubtless the basis of the corresponding conceptions 
in their descriptions. Other of these conceptions, however, we 
must seek in Germanic mythology. We have seen how Hel, 
originally the name of the goddess, came to mean the place of 
departed spirits. As such, like the Hellia of old Germany, and 
the Niflheimr of the North, it was a cold and dark and dreary 
land of shadows, deep down under the earth, just as Caedmon's 
wite hus, deop dreama leas, sinnihte beseald, but differing widely 
from the last, in that it, like Hellia and Niflheimr, was not a 
place of punishment, but only the realm of the dead, of all who 
had fallen in battle, like Hades. 

" Quite different now, in this respect, was Nastrond, which 
Kemble^ describes as a place of torment and punishment, the 
strand of the dead, filled with foulness, dark and cold and gloomy. 
Kemble adds, ^ The kingdom of Hel was Hades, the invisible world 
of shadows ; Nastrond was what we call hell.^ 

" In the course of time these conceptions of Hel and Nastrond 
grew closer together, and, finally, the two were no longer separate.^' 

This fusion, Deering thinks, accounts, for example, for the 
paradoxical presence of both fire and extreme cold in the Anglo- 
Saxon hell ; the latter being the old mythological element, the 
former the new Christian element. 

'^ To these fundamental outlines now,^^ he continues, '^ were 
added numerous details; the shadowy forms in these vague 
pictures were touched up with glaring colors. In the numerous 
Visions ^ of those said to have died and risen again, helFs horrors 
are portrayed with appalling vividness.'' 

A more careful study of the visions and their development 
before Gregory and Bede would, I believe, have caused Deering 
to lay less stress upon the influence of Germanic mythology on 
the Anglo-Saxon hell. Moreover, it is incorrect to speak of the 
visionaries as having ^'died and risen again." 

^SaxonA in England, i, p. 395. 



56 The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell. 

It would, of course, be folly to deny that the traditions of 
GermaDic mythology lived on after the introduction of Chris- 
tianity. It is, indeed, most probable that the general picture 
which the Anglo-Saxon poets had in mind when they wrote of 
hell was that of the traditional cold, wind-swept place which 
their fathers had conceived. Many of the general terms used 
to designate the abode of the dead indubitably point to this. 
But the detail, the specific attributes ascribed by the poets to 
their hell, must have had a different model. 

Deeriiig closes his treatment with the remark, p. 60 : ^' We in- 
cline to the opinion that, in their descriptions, the poets have 
made but little direct use of any Latin originals (!), but have 
for the most part simply embodied current belief, Christian- 
heathen as it was, according to their own plans. Some degree 
of originality and genius they surely must have had." 

This last remark from a student of Anglo-Saxon borders upon 
philological heresy. No one will deny for a moment that the 
Anglo-Saxon imagination was most fertile, and that other-world 
descriptions, which had no basis whatsoever in fact, would allow 
the poet the broadest possible scope in the exercise of this faculty. 
The Anglo-Saxon poet loves to expand his theme to its utmost 
limits ; to change the mere black and white of his copy to a 
many-colored, flowery word-painting. CynewulFs genius, in par- 
ticular, was distinctly lyrical in its nature, and rapid and sustained 
action is foreign to his work. He never invents a situation or 
a circumstance, but having found it in his model, he places it 
in every conceivable light, and with it as a corner-stone, builds 
up upon it a structure of poetry all his own. And what is true 
of Cynewulf is equally true in a greater or less degree of all 
Anglo-Saxon poetry. Even Beowulf, an epic, and from its 
very nature a poem of incident and action, frequently stops in 
its never very wild career to describe, in characteristic compounds 
and collocations, the beauties of some natural feature, of some 
cave or lake, some hall or hero, after which the unwilling story 
is again resumed. 

I recall this well-known feature of Anglo-Saxon poetical style 
in this connection because it goes to prove that the Anglo-Saxon 
poet, though he might elaborate, would never invent a situation 



The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell. 57 

or torment for his hell. Hence, since Germanic mythology 
furnished merely the most general outlines of his conception, he 
must have found the detail in Christian accounts. The religious 
poets were always, we may now pretty certainly assume, monks 
and scholars, and Latin, to say nothing of Greek, learning was 
universal among them. Cynewulf, at all events, was well ac- 
quainted with Gregory, Augustine, Bede, and others of the church 
fathers, whose works were usually alive with those orthodox 
continental accounts of hell and purgatory whose growth, as far 
as visions are concerned, has already been traced. The very fact 
that so much of the late Anglo-Saxon poetry — and prose, for 
that matter — deals specifically with subjects connected with the 
final doom and its results, goes to show that the epidemic of 
terror which, under the skillful management of the clergy, had 
already begun its work on the continent, had made itself felt to 
some degree in England. Bede, a disciple, in a way, of Gregory, 
was widely read, and was, as has been said, chiefly responsible 
for the promulgation of the doctrine of purgatory in England — 
a doctrine which was probably well established when Cynewulf 
wrote. Homilists and preachers were no doubt very active in 
publishing, witli original additions, the accounts of the other 
world which they found in books ; and the visions, especially 
those recounted by Gregory and Bede, were powerful tools ready 
to their hands. 

The following comparison of the hell of the Anglo-Saxon 
poets, in respect of detail, with the orthodox patristic accounts, 
will speak for itself. For the illustrative passages I am in the 
main indebted to Deering^s compilation, which I have taken 
occasion here and there to augment. 

Hell is represented as a deep abyss or gulf, grund, heUegrundj 
scrcef, witescrcef, dcel, etc., which conception may have been 
derived either from Scriptures or from mythology. Hell is also 
termed mor^orhof, EL, 1302; mor^orhus, Cr., 1625; dea^sele, Cr.^ 
1587 ; wyrmsele^ Jud., 119, etc., the figure being that of an earthly 
prison — a kind of word-metaphor which we should naturally 
expect from a poet who compares Christ on his heavenly throne 
to the ring-giver in the mead-hall. 



r 



58 The Medieval Visions of Heaven and HelL 

The situation of hell is under the earth. This is evident from 
the use of such terms as grundj scrcef, dcely etc. But compare 
particularly Rid., XLi, 40 f. : 

eac is under eor>an eal sceawige 
worn wra^scrafu wrajra gsesta. 

These are all instances of Anglo-Saxon expansion, and we 
need not seek their genesis elsewhere than in the poets' brain. 

The great spaciousness of hell is often dwelt upon. Thus it 
is grundleaSj Or., 1546; sidan sele, CS., 131, while CS., 721, 
represents it as 100,000 miles in extent from top to bottom.^ 

In strange contrast to this, thinks Deering, " is the idea of 
limitation, narrowness and confinement brought out in terms like 
in ]}am engan ham, EL, 920 ; cenga stede, Gen., 356 ; ufan hit 
is enge, Bi D.D., 22 ; ^ces engestan e^elrices, 88., 21 3.'^ 

But it is not strange, inasmuch as the terms of spaciousness 
are to be interpreted literally, whereas those of narrowness per- 
mit of no other than a figurative interpretation. The word enge, 
the one invariably employed in the cases under consideration, 
is more frequently used in its metaphorical than in its literal 

sense. Compare Elene^ 1260, 

nearusorge dreah, 
enge rune . . . 

where both nearu and enge are used in the sense of oppressive. 
Or it may mean cruel, painful, as in Phoenix, 52, enga dea^. 
The same thing often applies to the word cald, in such colloca- 
tions as caldan clommum, Cr., 1629, where it probably means 
simply cheerless, hopeless, with no reference at all to temperature. 
This will explain away a part of the second anomaly which 
Deering finds in the Anglo-Saxon descriptions of hell, namely, 
the presence of both heat and cold among the torments. "Thus 

^Cf. Enoch, XXI, 4 ; p. 23, above, note. 

I have employed Deering's abbreviations throughout this section. CS. {Crist 
und Satan), so called by Grein, includes an account of the harrowing of 
hell. Cf. Grein-Wuelker. ir, 542 f. Bi Domes Dcege and Be Domes D(Bgs are 
two distinct poems on the judgment day. Cf. Gr.-Wuelk., ii, 251 ; iii, 171. 
Another poem on the harrowing of hell will be found in Gr -Wuelk., iii, 175. 
SS. is the poem, Salomon und Saturit. The other abbreviations are self- 
explanatory. 



The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell. 59 

hell is not only ])cet hate dcel, Cr., 1542, hate sct'cefj CS., 419, 
but also ]}onne caldan grund, CS., 637, where men are bound 
down in cold fetters, caldan clommum, Or., 1629, as well as in 
fiery bonds." This, as was said above, Deering has explained 
by supposing the mythological and Christian ideas of hell to 
have been present together in the poet's mind. But we have 
no need to go so far for a solution. It has already been pointed 
out, p. 11, above, that extreme cold existed side by side with the 
torment of fire in the Buddhist hells. We have the same feature 
in the Book of Enoch, and in innumerable Christian accounts, 
including the Vision of Drihthelm, given above. So the double- 
torment idea was current in England some time before Cynewulf 
wrote. It is interesting to note the survival of this conception 
long after visions had ceased to be credited. Thus, Shakespeare, 
Meas. for Meas., ii, 1, has : 

Claudio : Ay, but to die and go we know not where ; 
To lie in cold obstruction, and to rot; 
This sensible warm motion to become 
A kneaded clod ; and the delighted spirit 
To bathe in fiery floods, or to reside 
In thrilling regions of thick-ribbed ice ; 
To be imprisoned in the viewless winds 
And blown with restless violence round about 
The pendant world. ... 

or Milton, Par. Lost, ii, 601 : 

The bitter change 
Of fierce extremes, extremes by change more fierce, 
From beds of raging fire to starve in ice 
Their soft ethereal warmth. 

Many passages could be cited from Middle-English literature 
in which the same idea is dwelt upon. A notable example is 
the Judas legend,^ detached portions of which are often met with 
in the romantic and legendary literature. In the Brandan legend 
Judas is represented as seated upon a rock in the middle of the 
ocean, suffering the torment of fire on one side of his body, that 
of extreme cold on the other. This punishment constitutes a 

^ For a study of this legend, see Creizenach, "Judas Ischarioth in Legende 
und Sage des Mittelalters," Paul & Braunt's Beitrdge, ii, p. 177 f. 



60 The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell. 

respite which is granted him every Sunday ; during the re- 
mainder of the week he is tormented in hell-fire with Pilate, 
Herod, Annas, and Caiaphas. 

Similar is a passage from the romance of Huon of Burdeux} 
Huon, on board a vessel, hears a thunderous roar, and grows 
fearful. A mariner is told to find out what it is, ^' and so he 
dyd, and behelde that waye/and at last he parseyued the daunger- 
ous Goulfe, whereof he had harde often tymes spoken of/ whereof 
he had suche fere that nere hand he had fallen downe into the 
see /he came downe and sayd to the patron, ^Sir, we be al in 
the way to be lost, for we be nere one of the Goulfes of Hel. . . .' " 
Judas, eternally damned, is seated upon a piece of canvas which 
rides the waves. He bemoans his lot most bitterly, and warns 
the mariners of their danger. They escape unharmed. 

For Dante's wonderful portrayal of Judas's punishment, see 
Inferno, canto xxxiv. 

The cold wind of the. Vision of Drihthelm, and of the hell of 
Germanic mythology, also occurs in some Anglo-Saxon accounts. 
Deering quotes the following passage from Genesis, 313 f. : 

pser habba^ heo on efen ungemet lange 
ealra feonda gehwilc fyr edneowe : 
l>onne Gym's on uhtan easterne wind, 
forst fyrnum cald, symble fyr ©"S^e gar. 

There are but few, very few, passages of this kind in the Caed- 
monic poems, for the Christian conceptions had not yet gained 
wide currency in England when they were written. The passage 
just quoted is a part of the interpolation from the Old Saxon 
Genesis, and may therefore be assigned a considerably later date 
than the body of the poem. It would be another proof, if such 
were now needed, of the correctness of Sievers' theory concerning 
Genesis B. 

The fact of the flame of helFs fire giving no light — Deering's 
third paradox — is constantly emphasized, and sweart is a favorite 
epithet for it.^ Aelfric expresses this belief most clearly. " The 

'^See Lee's edition of Lord Berners' translation, E. E. T. S., Ex. Ser., vol. 41; 
2, p. 361. 

'''Hell is thus referred to five times in the interpolated portion of Genesis : 
312, 345, 529, 761, 792. For note on smart, see W. E. Mead, "Color in Old 
English Poetry," Pubs. Mod. Lang. Ass., N. S.. vir, 2. 



The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell. 61 

miserable guilty ones/' he says, *' shall suffer torment in ever- 
lasting fire, and yet that swart fire shall give them no light." * 
And again, "Verily, the hellish fire has unspeakable heat and 
no light, but burns eternally in swart darkness." ^ In this con- 
ception we very probably have a reminiscence of the classical 
"lux atra." 

Filth and stench, invariable attributes of the patristic hell 
and purgatory, are also met with in the Anglo-Saxon poets. 
Thus, Be D. D., 205, lig and cyle and la^lic fuL Stench in Be 
B. D., 207 f. : 

hy mid nosan ne magon naht geswseccan 
butan instences ormsetnesse. 

In St. PauFs vision, and in many other accounts, the torment 
of stench is given a most prominent position. 

The loathsome flood, or river, so conspicuous a feature in 
almost all detailed early Christian accounts of hell, is only hinted 
at by the Anglo-Saxon poets. SS., 939, we have wceter insende, 
a torment of the fallen angels. 

But the monstrous serpents and dragons with which the im- 
aginations of the visionaries always peopled these horrible bodies 
of water, are constantly introduced by the Anglo-Saxon poets. 
SS., 941 f., atol deor monig irenum hornum, with which compare 
St. Paul, Vernon MS., 1. 135 f. : 

Brennyng dragouns and serpentes i-fere 
Honginge aboute heor nekkes were, 
Gnawing hem to don hem schom, 
To tere the flesh from the bon ; 
And ther weore foure angels to telle 
That weren of the hous of helle, 
. Brennynge homes hadde thei on hed, 
Thei hem turmented. . . . 

SS., 943 f., we have hlodige earnas and blace n(E]}]>ran. Whence 
the Anglo-Saxon poet derived the conception of " bloody eagles," 
and just what function they were supposed to fulfil in the system 
of hell-torment, is something of a mystery. Possibly the poet 
misread his Latin original, if he had one. More probably he 

1 Thorpe, i, 133. ' Thorpe, i, 531. 



62 The Ifedieval Visions of Heaven and Hell. 

had in mind some mythological story, perhaps the eagle of 
Prometheus. 

In O,, 1 548, we have : 

wrajjum wyrmum and mid wita fela 
frecnum feorhgomum folcum scende'S. 

In Jud.j 119, hell is termed wyrmsele. The fire-breathing dragons 
which guard the entrance to hell, CaS., 98 f., 

ece set helle duru dracan eardiga'S 
hate on hre>re, 

are certainly a reminiscence of the Cerberus myth or its con- 
comitants, with perhaps an admixture of the Germanic dragons. 

The torments of hunger and thirst, lack of sleep, toil, weariness, 
sickness, disease, old age, etc., constitute a catalogue of the ills 
which mankind is heir to, and would naturally be adduced in 
any list of discomforts. They are, as Deering correctly says 
(p. 55), directly contrasted with the corresponding joys of heaven, 
Crist, 1 653 f.. Be Domes Dcege, 255 f. Phoenix, 611 f , etc. Compare 
also the passage, already quoted in another connection, from the 
Vision of Adamnan (p. 34, above). 

The torments of the mind which the damned have to undergo 
are also particularly emphasized by the Anglo-Saxon poets, and 
we have in them another feature borrowed directly from the 
patristic accounts. We find, too, the biblical weeping, wailing, 
and gnashing of teeth, heof, 88., 935, wop, 88., 934, grishitung, 
Be D. D., 226, to]>a geheaw, C8., 339, etc. See especially the 
homilies in this connection. 

Exclusion from the sight of .God is another feature of a dis- 
tinctly Christian nature. Compare Or., 1537 f., nales dryhtnes 
gemynd si^^an geseca^. EL, 1301 f., etc. 

One of the most striking torments of this nature Deering 
seems to have overlooked — namely, that the damned will be 
forced to look upon the bliss of the blessed. This is a feature 
but rarely met with in the visions; but it is characteristic of 
many oriental accounts, especially the Mohammedan. Compare 
Om^, 1285 f.: 



The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell. 63 

t>onne bi"?? J?fet bridde ^earfendum sorg, 

cwihende cearo, bset hy on ba cla?nan secS, 

hu hi fore goddaedum glade blissia^, 

\>& hi unsaelge aer forhogdun 

to donne, ^onne him dagas Isestun, 

and be hyra weorcum wepende sar, 

|>set hi ser freolice fremedon unriht. 

Geseo'5 hi >a betran blaede scinan: 

ne bi'S him hyra yrm'Su an to wite, 

ac ^ara oi>erra ead to sorgum, 

baes >e hy swa fsegre gefean on fyrndagum 

and swa aenlice anforletun 

hurh leaslice lices wynne, 

earges flseschoman idelne lust. 

The everlastingness of hell-torment is finely dwelt upon in 

Crist, 15411: 

l^aet is ece cwealm ! 
Ke mseg J?aet hate dsel of heolo^cynne 
in sinnehte synne forbaernan 
to widan feore worn of haere sawle, 
ac l^aer se deopa sea'S dreorge fede'5, 
grundleas gieme gassta on beostre, 
aele15 hy mid >y ealdan lige and mid \>j egsan forste, 
wra^um wyrmum and mid wita fela 
frecnum feorhgomum folcum scende'S. 

Compare also Judith, 117 f. : 

Ne >earf he hopian no 
J>ystrum forhylmed, }>aet he ISonan mote 
of Mm wyrmsele, ac l^aer wunian sceal 
awa to aldre butan ende for'5 
in "Sam heolstran ham, hyhtwynna leas. 

By summarizing these scattered references to the fate of the 
sinful soul after death, we are enabled to arrive at a fairly 
accurate statement of the Anglo-Saxon poets' conception of hell. 
Hell is a deep pit under the earth, incalculably immense in area, 
shrouded in eternal darkness. The principal torment is that of 
fire, but the flame is black, and burns without light. Side by 
side with extreme heat is the torment of cold ; storms of wind, 
hail, and frost sweep down from the four corners of hell. Frightful 
monsters, dragons, serpents, bloody eagles, people the awful depths, 
and dragons guard the entrance. The sinful souls are bound 



64 The Medieval Visions of Heaven and HelL 

down with fetters, sufferiog the utmost agonies of mind in addition 
to those of the body. Consumed with bitter remorse and despair, 
they must remain thus eternally, without hope of ever being re- 
leased from their suflferings or of gaining the bliss of the righteous, 
which they are forced to look upon. 

Such a summarizing of widely-scattered elements, covering 
the whole field of Anglo-Saxon poetry, is not, perhaps, an en- 
tirely legitimate procedure. Still it is, in the main, only with 
Cynewulf that we are dealing, and the summary may, therefore, 
reasonably be considered to represent his conception of hell. 
The passages quoted from Judith and the Riddles are quite in 
Cynewulf^s manner, and furnish stylistic evidence in favor of 
attributing those works to Cynewulf himself, or to an imitator 
of him. The resemblance between Cynewulf's conception of 
hell and the orthodox accounts of the church fathers and the 
early vision-writers is, it seems to me, very plain. Even should 
we deny to Cynewulf a knowledge of any writer other than 
Bede, the Vision of Drihthelm alone would be a sufficient basis 
for the greater part of his conception. But we know to a 
certainty that he was also acquainted with Gregory; probably 
with Augustine and Alcuin, and very possibly with any number 
of other writers. I am therefore inclined to think that the 
Anglo-Saxon poets, especially Cynewulf and his school, derived 
their conceptions not nearly so much from the surviving traditions 
of Germanic mythology as from the writings of the church fathers. 
Their hell, therefore, is a purely literary product, with perhaps 
a very light background of tradition. This statement applies with 
even greater force to the homilists, who will next be considered. 

The question of purgatory among both poets and homilists is 
a very interesting one, and seemed worthy of a separate treatment. 

(6) The Homilists, 

The Anglo-Saxon homilies — Blickling collection, Aelfric,Wulf- 
stan — are alive with descriptions of the day of doom, and of the 
state of affairs which will follow it. This, of course, is to be 
expected, since they were written toward the close of the tenth 
and at the beginning of the eleventh century, when thoughts 



The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell. 65 

and fears of a momentary arrival of the judgment day were 
uppermost in men's minds. " No man on earth/' says the Blick- 
ling homilist in his sermon on Ascension Day, '^ is so holy, and 
none in heaven, as to know when our Lord will put an end 
to the world on the judgment day, save only the Lord alone. 
Yet we know that the time is not far distant, since the signs 
and tokens which the Lord foretold would happen before the 
last day have all been fulfilled, with the single exception that 
the accursed stranger, the Antichrist, has not yet come to earth. 
Yet it will not now be long before that also shall happen ; for 
this earth must necessarily end in the time which is now present, 
since five ages have already passed. In this age of the world, 
then, shall this earth come to an end, and the greater part of it 
has already elapsed — exactly nine hundred and seventy-one years 
this year." 

Whether the clergy themselves shared in the universal panic 
is very doubtful; but that they employed every possible means 
to keep fear at fever heat is evident from the literature of the 
time. Preachers all over Europe were proclaiming, in voices of 
thunder, the terrible torments of hell which were soon to befall 
sinners : the surest way to escape at least a part of the awful, 
universal doom was to renounce all earthly pomp and pleasure, 
and to lead a life of poverty and penance till the judgment-day 
should fall. In other words, divide your worldly possessions 
among the poor, or, better still, bestow them upon the church, 
and you may possibly escape eternal damnation. We cannot 
doubt that the panic proved a fruitful source of revenue to the 
<3hurch, whether the clergy were sincere in their utterances, or not. 

The descriptions of hell which we find in these homilies tally 
very closely with those of the Anglo-Saxon poets. In the homilies, 
however, we have connected accounts, and we may call them the 
fruits of the first popular attempt on English soil to apply the 
visions practically. Bede had done the same thing, to be sure, 
but only incidentally, recording the fact and drawing the moral 
with a view rather to stimulating to a better life on earth, than 
to strengthening a belief in the doctrines of hell and purgatory. 
We need only to compare the manner of Bede's narration of the 
visions of Furseus and Drihthelm with that of Aelfric, when 
5 



66 The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell, 

recounting the same visions, in order at once to recognize in the 
one the historian, to whom the fact is everything, and in the other 
the preacher, to whom it is merely a vehicle for moral precept. 

The homilists have retained much of the poetical vocabulary^ 
in their descriptions. Thus, in Blickling Hom., v,^ "And they 
do not consider that the greedy hell is ever open to devils.^' Swart 
is a favorite attribute for flame, as in the poets. Aelfric,^ "That 
swart fire shall give them no light.'^ Instances could be multiplied. 

A few representative passages from the homilies will serve to 
indicate the intimate way in which they are connected with the- 
visions. As regards the Vision of St. Paul, we find a remarkable 
difference of opinion between the Blickling homilists and Aelfric. 
The former refer to the work as they would to any canonical 
book of Scripture, sometimes introducing a quotation from it with 
a mere '^St. Paul said,'^ without further reference to the source; 
and the words of the vision carry as much authority as would' 
those of the epistles. Wright, St. Patrick^s Purgatory, p. 7, is,, 
therefore, in error when he says : " He (Aelfric), as well as 
other earlier writers who allude to this latter vision {St. Paul),. 
pretend to no further knowledge of it than what ipay be gathered 
from, the apostle's own words, who mentions a person that had 
been carried in the spirit to the third heaven." The statement 
will not apply to the Blickling homilies, to which Wright is 
evidently referring. Thus, in Homily iv, we find the following t 
^^Oh!' said St. Paul, ^ that is accounted the devil's treasure 
for a man to hide his sins from his confessor,' because to our 
adversary a man's sins are more acceptable than all earthly 
treasure. The priest that is very tardy in driving out the devil 
from a man, and in speedily ridding the soul with oil and water 
against the adversary, shall be assigned to the fiery river and 
the iron hook. For St. Paul said that he was not far from the 
side of the priest of whom we have said above that he was drawn 
by the iron hook into the pitchy river, another old man ^ whom 
four accursed angels led, with great cruelty, and sank him into the 
fiery water tip ^o his knees, 2iiL\d they had bound him with fiery chains 
so that he could not say, ^ God, have mercy upon me." Thea 

1 Morris, p. 60. « Thorpe, i, p. 133. 

* Vernon MS., 1. 173 f. Cf. Paul, sect. 10. 



The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell, 67 

said the eminent teacher to the angel that led him, ^ Who is this 
old man?' The angel replied, 'He is a bishop who did more 
evil than good. Before the world he had a great name, and dis- 
regarded it all, and his Creator, who had given him that name.' 
Then said St. Paul, that since the bishop had not shown mercy 
to orphans, nor to widows, nor to any of God's poor, he was 
requited according to his own deeds.'' ^ 

The vision is frequently thus referred to and quoted ; in fact 
it, together with the Gospel of Nicodemus, constitutes the prin- 
cipal basis for the Blickling homilists' conception of hell. 

Aelfric, on the other hand, who everywhere shows his superi- 
ority to his predecessors, says : '' How do some men read the 
false composition^ which they call the vision of Paul, when he 
himself said that he heard the secret words which no earthly 
man may speak? "^ Both of which opinions go to show that 
the Vision of St. Paul must have been a well-known work in 
England probably as early as the tenth century, since it was so 
familiarly spoken of at the beginning of the eleventh. No doubt 
it was one of the earliest Christian importations into England. 

Despite his derogatory statement, Aelfric would appear once 
at least to quote from Paul's vision. Thus, he says: "In this 
present church are mingled good and evil, as clean corn with 
foul cockle : but at the end of this world the true judge will 
bid his angels gather the cockle by burthens, and cast it into 
the unquenchable fire. By burthens they will gather the sinful 
from the righteous ; then will murderers he tied together in the 
hellish fire, and robbers with robbers^ the covetous with the covetous, 
adulterers with adulterers; and so all wicked associates bound 
together shall be brought into God's barn : that is, the righteous 
shall be brought to everlasting life, where storm comes not, nor 
any tempest that may injure the corn. Then will the good be 
nowhere but in heaven, and the evil nowhere but in hell."^ 

With this compare Vision of St, Paw^, Vernon MS., 1. 76 : 

As God seide in the gospel thore, 

Ligate per fasciculos ad comburendum: 
Byndetli hem in knucchenes forthi 
To brenne lyk to licchi, 

' Morris, p. 42. ^ Thorpe, ii, p. 333. ' Thorpe, i, p. 527. 



68 The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell, 

Spous-brekers with lechours, 
Rauisschers with rauisschers, 
Wikked with wikked also. . . . 

And again, Aelfric says : " The miserable guilty ones shall suffer 
torment in everlasting fire, and yet that swart fire shall give them 
no light. Worms shall tear their bodies with fiery teeth, as 
Christ said in His gospel, * There their worms shall never die, 
nor their fire be quenched/ Here shall be associated in one 
torment those who in life were united in evil deeds, so that 
murderers shall eternally be tortured together ; and adulterers 
with adulterers, the rapacious with the rapacious, robbers with 
robbers, perjurers with perjurers, in the broad flame without any 
ending shall perish. There shall be weeping and gnashing of 
teeth ; for their eyes shall be tormented in the great burning, 
and their teeth shall afterwards quake in the intense cold."^ 

This physical explanation of the weeping and gnashing of 
teeth is refreshingly novel, and finds an echo in the Vision of 
Tandahy sect. 7. In this passage, too, we again meet with the 
oft-mentioned double torment of extreme cold and heat. 

The homilies of the twelfth, thirteenth, and fourteenth centuries 
are full of descriptions of hell which tally closely with those of 
the visions. A single example will suffice. The following 
passage is from the SouCs Ward, a twelfth century homily (com- 
pare Morris, 0. E. Homilies ^ First Ser., p. 250) : 

Hell is wide without measure, and deep and bottomless ; full 
of incomparable fire, for no earthly fire may be compared there- 
with. Full of stench intolerable, for no living thing on earth 
might endure it. Full of unutterable sorrow, for no mouth may, , 
on account of the wretchedness and woe thereof, give an account 
of nor tell about it. Yea, the darkness therein is so thick that 
one may grasp it, for the fire there gives no lights but blindeth the 
eyes of them that are there with a smothering smohe, the worst of 
smolces. And nevertheless in that same black darkness they 
see black things as devils, that ever maul them and afflict 
them . . . ; and tailed dragons, horrible as devils, that devour 
them, whole and spew them out afterwards; at other times they 

^ Thorpe, i, p. 133. 



The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell. 69 

rend them to pieces and chew each gobbet of them^ and they after- 
wards become whole again . ... to undergo again such bale 
without recovery .... loathsome hell-worms^ toads and frogs .... 
creep in and out at the mouthy ears^ eyes, navel, and at the hollow 
of the breast, as maggots in puh^id flesh. There is shrieking in the 
flame, and chattering of teeth in the snowy waters. Suddenly they 
flit from the heat to the cold, nor ever do they know which of the 
two is worse for them, for each is intolerable. And in this mar- 
velous mingling, the latter, through the former, tormenteth the 
more. (Compare Milton, p. 59, above.) The fire consumes 
them all to dead coals ; the pitch boileth them until they are 
altogether melted, and revives them anon to undergo the same, 
and much worse .... to continue in woe, world without end, 
ever in eternity. ... I have begun to tell of things that I am 
not able to bring to any end, though I had a thousand tongues 
of steel (compare p. 33, above, St. Paul) .... to endure and 
to bear their immense blows with steel mallets, and with their 
red-hot awls, and their buffetings, as though it might be a pitch- 
clout, each one toward the other, in divers pains. O hell, death's 
house, abode of woe, of dread, and of groaning; horrid home and 
hard dwelling of all miseries ; city of bale, and the abode of 
every bitterness, thou most loathsome land of all, thou dark place 
filled with all dreariness ! 

The retention of some of the Anglo-Saxon characteristics would 
seem to point to the Anglo-Saxon homilies as part-model for this 
passage. The first italicized passage, in particular, unmistakably 
recalls the passage quoted above from Aelfric. The second passage 
in italics seems undoubtedly copied from the Vision of Tundaie, 
sect. 10. 

3. The Anglo-Saxon Purgatory. 

We have already seen that Bede gave expression to a clearly- 
defined doctrine of purgatory, as an abode for moderately sinful 
souls in which they would be cleansed by fire of their evil 
deeds, preparatory to entering upon eternal bliss ; this as dis- 
tinguished from hell, the abode of the eternally damned. On the 
continent, Gregory I is generally conceded to have been the first 
definitely to formulate the doctrine, which, in that peculiar form, 



70 The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell. 

is a purely Christian product. The fundamental idea of a pro- 
bationary state is, however, much older. The Buddhist hells 
are, strictly speaking, purgatories, since a definite time-limit is 
always set. 

The scriptural passages upon which the doctrine of purgatory 
rests are Second Mace, xii, 43-46 (which is adduced not merely 
on the supposition that it is inspired, but even as a simple his- 
torical testimony); Matt., xii, 32, ^^But whoever speaketh against 
the Holy Ghost, it shall not be forgiven him, neither in this 
world, neither in the world to come;'^ First Cor., iii, 11-15, 
already referred to ; First Cor., xv, 29 ; also Psalms, xxxviii, 1, 
and LXV, 12. Besides Gregory, in whom the doctrine is found 
in all the fullness of its modern detail, direct testimony is given 
by Tertullian, Cyprian, Arnobius, Lactantius, Hilary, Ambrose, 
and, above all, Augustine, among the Latins; and by Clement 
of Alexandria, Origen, Eusebius, Athanasius and others among 
the Greeks. 

It seems strange, in view of the fact that the doctrine, in its 
more modern form, must have been pretty well known in England 
in the tenth and eleventh centuries, that we find practically no 
expression of it in the works of the homilists. Aelfric, in fact, 
expressly states, "Then will the good be nowhere but in heaven, 
the evil nowhere but in hell." ^ We find, to be sure, a few 
vague intimations of a probationary state : for example, " .... he 
will command you to be bound and set in prison, that is, in hell- 
torment ; and then the devil will torture you, until ye shall have 
suffered for all your trespasses, until ye come to one farthing.^'' ^ 
But far more frequently eternal torment is the lot of all evil- 
doers : ''the miserable evil-doers shall suffer torment in ever- 
lasting fire ; " " there their worms shall never die, nor their 
fire be quenched,'^ ^ etc. 

It has already been said that the Anglo-Saxon poets, following 
the scriptural statement, conceived of the fires of the judgment- 
day as purgatorial, and this is the closest approach to a doctrine 
of an intermediary state which we find in them. The most 
striking passages in which the purifying quality of the dooms- 
day fire is dwelt upon are the following : 

1 Thorpe, i, p. 527. « Thorpe, i, p. 267. ^ Thorpe, i, p. 527. 



The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell. 71 

€rist, 1102 £,: ' 

ac >aet fyr nirae'S )>urh foldan gehwaet, 
grsefe'S grimlice, georne asece'5, 
innan and utan, eorhin sceatas, 
obt'set eal hafaS aeldes leoma 
woruld-widles worn waeline forbaerned. 

Here we have the conception in its widest and most general 

application ; that is, the whole world shall be purified. More 

particular in reference to souls of men is 

Om^, 1059f.: 

bonne byrne Costa's 
hat and heorugifre, hu gehealdne sind 
sawle wi'5 synnum fore sigedeman. 

Rather more vaguely the same thought is expressed in 

Phoenix, 521 f. : 

Hat bi'S monegum 
egeslic aeled, bonne anra geh^vylc, 
so'Sfaest ge synnig sawel mid lie, 
from raoldgrafum sece^ meotudes dom 
forht afpered. Fyr bi^ on tihte, 
sele^ uncyste. 

Similar passages occur in the special poems on the judgment- 
day. But the most remarkable passage of all occurs in the 
epilogue to the Elene, The lines which particularly interest us 
are 1285 f. The poet is speaking of what will happen on the 

judgment-day: 

bonne on breo defile's 

in fyres feng folc anra gehwylc, 

so^faeste hio'S 
yferaest in bam ade .... 

.... swa hie adreogan magon 
modigra raaegen : him gemetga^ eall 
eldes leoma, swa him e'Sost bi'S, 
sylfum geseftost. Synfulle beo'S 
mane gemengde in bam midle bread, 
bale's higegeomre in hatne wylm, 
brosme bebehte. Bi^ se bridda dsel 
awyrgede womscealSan in bees wylmes grund, 
lease leodhatan lige befaested 
burh aergewyrht, arleasra sceolu 
in gleda gripe. Gode no si'S^an 



72 The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell, 

of )>am mor"Sorhofe in gemynd cuma^, 

wuldorcyninge, ac hie worpene beo^ 

of )?am hea^uwylme in helle griind 

torngeni'Slan. Hi's ]?am twam daelum 

ungelice : moton engla frean 

geseon, sigora god : hie asodene bee's, 

asundrod fram synnum swa smaete gold, i 

>8et in wylme bi'S womma gehwylces 

hurh ofnes fyr eall geclsensod, 

amered and gemylted : swa bi^ ]?ara manna selc 

ascyred and asceaden, scylda gehwylcre, 

deopra firena >urh bres domes fyr. 

It is, of course, Impossible to determine with certainty who was 
CynewulPs immediate model for this passage. The conception 
of a three-fold division of mankind in the fires of judgment is 
several times met with in the works of the church fathers* 
Gaebler, ^^Autorschaft vom Phoenix/^ ^ cites Augustine's Sermo, 
crv, in the Recapitulatio * of which a " sors triplex hominum in 
judicio " is dwelt upon. Cook ^ finds a closer parallel in a work 
of Alcuin's, which would seem to have been modelled upon 
Augustine. Cook also cites similar passages from Gregory and 
Bede. The very fact that so many writers dwell upon it, is 
evidence that the idea was current in the Middle Ages ; and it 
is most probable that Cynewulf, who states merely the bare 
fact, was drawing from his own memory. Augustine was, no 
doubt, the first to give expression to the idea. 

What we have in the Anglo-Saxon account is briefly this : 
The souls, on the judgment-day, will be disposed, according to 
their deeds, in the avenging fire. The good will occupy the 
uppermost portions of the flame and will escape unscathed ; the 
"sinful" will be placed in the middle; whereas the z^omscea'San, 
the leodhatan — that is, probably, the perpetrators of capital 
crimes — will occupy the third and lowest portion of the flame, 
that is, hell. These last will never attain to blessedness, but 
the other two divisions are different : these will be purified and 
refined like gold, and, when cleansed of their sins, be admitted 
to the abodes of the righteous. Cook says, "to the three- fold 

^Anglia, iii, p. 488 f. » Migne, Pat. LaU, 39, col. 1949. 

3 " Date of the Elem,'" Anglia, xv, p. 9 f. 



The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell. 73 

division will succeed a two-fold," but, however the patristic 
accounts may read, the Anglo-Saxon poet can hardly be inter- 
preted to say so. He simply states: "BicS ];am twani daelum 
ungelice," that is, the third section is unlike the other two. 

It is particularly interesting to note that we find a three- 
fold division of souls in two widely-different works, both earlier 
than Augustine — the Book of Enoch and Plutarch's Vision of 
Thespesius, both of w'hich have already been analyzed in their 
relations to vision-literature. In the Book of Enoch we have the 
following, XXII, 9 : "I inquired .... respecting the general 
judgment, saying. Why is one separated from another? He 
answered. Three separations have been made between the spirits 
of the dead. ..." 

In the Vision of Thespesius we have a closer analogue. Good 
souls are pure white, and undergo no punishment ; those whose 
sins are light — spotted souls — need endure but a short probation 
of torment ; but the great sinners are put to a terrible test of 
torment. If, after this, they are found to be hopelessly bad, 
they are then consigned to eternal damnation.^ The feature 
occurs in almost identically the same form in the Vision of 
Thurcill. The similarity to the Egyptian judgment has also 
already been pointed out.^ 

In the Vision of St Frances {Acta Sanct., Mar. 9), purgatory 
is divided into three distinct compartments : the first, an immense 
dungeon of ice ; the second, a caldron of boiling oil and pitch ; 
the third, a pond of liquid metal. 

The picture of souls flying about in the flame also recalls 
Thespesius, Drihthelm, Monk of Eynsham, and Thurcill, and, in 
a less degree, Furseus. 

These similarities may be mere coincidences, but it is very 
probable that we have in them another indication of the organic 
way in which the Anglo-Saxon conceptions of hell, etc., are con- 
nected with continental accounts. Here at least there can be 
no question of a survival of the traditions of Germanic mythology. 

» Cf. p. 28, above. « Above, p. 16. 



74 The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell. 

III. THE MIDDLE-ENGLISH VISIONS. 

« 

1. The Vision of St. Paul. 

Bibliographical Summary. 

The original work was written in Greek, in at least two 
versions belonging to the fourth century, A. D. Only one has 
come down to us. The other is mentioned by Epiphanius, under 
the title ^Ava/SariKov HavXov, in his work against eighty heresies 
(Migne, Pat. Gr., XLI, col. 656), and, after him, by Michael 
Glycas, Annal.j 2, 120. The extant version is described by St. 
Augustine (ninety-eighth tract upon the Gospel of St. John : 
Migne, Fat Lat.^ xxxv, col. 188), in this sentence : "Qua occa- 
sione vani quidam apocalypsim Pauli, quam sana non recipit 
Ecclesia, nesqui quibus fabulis plenam, stultissima praesumtione 
finxerunt." This version is probably represented by the text 
published by Tischendorf {Apocalypses Apocryphae, pages 34-69 ; 
xiv-xviii), from a fifteenth century MS. at Milan, collated with 
a thirteenth century MS. at Munich. Lt is accompanied by a 
translation into English of an ancient Syriac MS. by Rev. Justin 
Perkins. (Reprinted from the Journal of the American Oriental 
Society y vi. A German translation by Zingerle appeared in Heid- 
enheims Vierteljahrschrift, iv, 1 39-1 83). Herman Brandes, Englische 
Studien^ Vii, p. 36 f., mentions twenty-two MSS. containing Latin 
versions of the vision; these he divides into six redactions. Other 
MSS. in Latin are mentioned by Paul Meyer, Romania^ xxrv, 
p. 357, who also gives a list of French MSS. Up to the present 
time there have been published five English metrical versions, 
representing four different redactions. Brandes made a study of 
these in their relation to French and Latin versions in his essay, 
"Ueber die Quellen der mittelenglischen Versionen der Paulus- 
vision,^^ republished in Englische Studien, vii. Ward, Catalogue 
of Romances, ii, p. 397 f., describes nine Latin MSS. in the 
British Museum. 

The following are the English metrical versions (Brandes' 
redactions) : 

I. c. 1300. MS. Laud 108 (compare Horstmann, Altenglische 
Legenden, p. x). Bodleian Library. It is written in six-lined 



The Medieval Visions of Heaven and HelL 75 

strophes, third and sixth line having three stresses, the others 
four. The rime is aabccb. The dialect is Southern. Published 
by Horstmann, Henngs Archiv, Lii, p. 35 f. 

II. («) latter half thirteenth century. Jesus College MS. 29 ; 
composed in short rimed couplets, South-west dialect. Published 
by Morris, An Old English Miscellany {E. E. T. S., 49), p. 147 f. 

(6) 1304 (Warton) or c. 1290 (Horstmann). Digby MS. 86. 
Bodleian Library. Same as II (a). Southern dialect. Published 
by Horstmann, Herrigs Arxhiv, LXir, pages 403-406. 

III. (a) c. 1375. Vernon MS. Bodleian Library. Written in 
short rimed couplets. Southern dialect (Horstmann). Published 
by Morris, An 0. E. Miscellany, Appendix iii, p. 223 f., and by 
Horstmann, Englische Studien^ i, pages 293-299. 

(III. {b) end of fourteenth century. British Museum ad- 
ditional MS. 22283, containing a word for word transcription 
of first 124 lines of Vernon MS. version. Unpublished). 

IV. 1426. Douce MS. 302. Bodleian Library. Composed 
in thirteen-lined strophes, with the rime: ababbcbcdeeed. 
It is signed by John Audelay : 

For al is good that hath good end. 
Thus counsels you the blynd Audlay. 

Halliwell does not include the poem in his collection of Audelay^s 
poems {The Poems of John Audelay, ed. Halliwell, London, 1844: 
Percy Society Publications). Published by Morris, An 0. E. 
Miscellany, Appendix ii, pages 210-212. 

A prose English version of the vision is printed by Morris, 
Old English Homilies, First Series, p. 41. Also by Zupitza, Alt- und 
Mittelenglisches Uehungshuch, Second Edition, pages 62-65 (fifth 
edition, 1897, p. 88). 

The French versions were first enumerated by Paul Meyer, 
Romania, vi, p. 11. He found five. Three of these are more 
closely examined by Brandes, Englische Studien, vii, p. 51 f. One 
of these three was printed by Ozanam, Dante et la Philosophic 
Catholique au Xllli^me Siecle, p. 425 f. Ward describes two 
French versions in the British Museum : one by Adam de Roe, 
in 427 octosyllabic lines; the other in 579 lines, consisting of 
630 alexandrines, arranged in mono-rimed quatrains, together 



76 The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell. 

with 49 octosyllabic lines in the middle, occurring after the 
eighth alexandrine. Final enumeration of MSS. by Paul Meyer, 
Romania^ xxiv. 

It would be without the limits of the present study to compare 
the Greek, Latin, French, and English versions. This has, more- 
over, already been satisfactorily done by Brandes in the article 
above cited {E. 8.,yii). The "bridge of judgment^' does not 
occur in the original Greek, which corresponds far more closely 
than the Latin versions to the Apocalypse of Fet^r, Thus, for 
example, the " blood pool '' of Peter remains such in the Greek, 
but becomes a fire-lake in the Latin versions. 

A Latin version of our vision, following very closely the original 
Greek, and belonging to the eighth century, was published by Mr. 
M. R. James in Vol. ii of Texts and Studies (Cambridge, 1893). 
Compare further, P. Meyer, Romania^ xxiv, p. 358. 

Synopsis of Contents. 

(Note.' — The Vernon and Douce copies agree very closely, and probably had 
the same original. The Jesus Coll. version has many variants from them. 
Laud 108 is short, and presents no new features.) 

Vermon. — 1. Burning trees at helPs gates. Sinners suspended 
thereon from various portions of the body. 

2. A burning caldron, with seven flames of different colors. 

3. Seven pains : snow, ice, fire, blood, adders, lightning (?),^ 
stench. Souls who would do no penance were here tormented 
according to their deeds. They desired to die, but could not. 

4. Burning wheel, turned a thousand times a day, and at each 
turn a thousand souls are tormented (Jesus Coll., wheel of steel, 
with sharp spikes). 

5. Horrible flood, with many devilish beasts therein, which 
gnawed the souls without mercy. 

6. Very high bridge over the flood : righteous men pass un- 
scathed; sinners fall down from it, and are bound together in 
bundles, like to like. 

7. Souls immersed in the flood to various portions of the body 
which were most sinful. Backbiters are immersed to the knees ; 
adulterers, to the navel ; talkers in church, to the lips ; such as 
were glad of their neighbor's misfortune, to the eyebrows, etc. 



The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell. 77 

8. Souls gnawing their own tongues. (Jesus Coll., 10,000 
fiends gnaw the tongues of usurers.) 

9. Black maidens, clad in black clothing, boiling in pitch and 
brimstone, with reptiles about their necks, and four angels of 
hell, with burning horns, tormenting them. These were un- 
chaste, and destroyed their offspring. 

10. Souls with meat before them, which they could not eat. 
These would not fast. (Old man weeping between four yelling 
devils. He was negligent and unchaste.) 

11. Pit sealed with seven seals. A terrible stench proceeds 
from it. Whoever comes in here shall never find mercy. Here 
are those who did not believe in the incarnation of Christ, and 
would not receive baptism. They are devoured by worms, etc. 
(Jesus Coll., hungry hounds.) (A sinful soul which had just left 
the body was borne up by seven devils. He had read his own 
charter — also found in Laud 108 — and thereby judged himself. 
The devils hurl him into the darkest abyss for having violated 
the commandments. Every man shall be repaid according to his 
deeds. Next came a righteous soul, who was led to heaven amid 
rejoicing of the angels.) 

12. The souls in hell then prayed Paul and Michael to inter- 
cede for them. These do so, and a respite is granted the sinful 
ones from Saturday till Monday of every week, Christ first re- 
proving them in the words of Matt, xxv, 41 f. 

Additional Features from Jesus Coll. 3fS. — 1. Souls who robbed 
the poor, etc., are drawn in two by fiends, and one half is placed 
in fire, the other half in a " frozen fen.'' 

2. Stream mixed with blood. 

3. Old men among stinging adders. After being fretted to 
pieces, they are made whole again, that the torment may be re- 
newed. Four devils stand by and torture them. They would 
not pity the poor (evidently an expansion from the feature of 
the single old man in the Vernon MS. version, sect. 10). 

4. Deep gaol, with hot pool. Ten thousand devils and more 
torment the souls of the damned with awls. These doomed 
Christ to death. 

6. An " iron wall " full of the souls of those that were be- 
headed or hanged, etc. 



78 The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell, 

Discussion, 

The large majority of the Latin MSS. of our vision belong to 
the thirteenth century — no earlier; whereas all but one of the 
English versions are of the fourteenth century. Nevertheless, 
though the MSS. of all the other works which are yet to be treated 
bear dates as early, or earlier, we must in every case give Paul 
priority. The thirteenth century was the flourishing period of 
vision-literature, and was fertile in remodellings of old material 
as well as in the invention of new. Paul dilBPers from the other 
visions in question from the fact that it represents a developments 
or, rather, a growth. The late medieval vision of the thirteenth 
century bears little resemblance to the crude work of the fourth, 
and yet it is always the same work, enriched in the former 
instance by many new features which were attached to it by 
successive generations of narrators, and finally crystallized with, 
no doubt, still other additions by the writers of the twelfth and 
thirteenth centuries. The other visions, on the contrary, though 
they embodied much old material, molded it into a new form, 
gave it a new name and a new locality, aud thus lent it the 
semblance, at least, of originality and newness. 

It would prove a thankless task to attempt to determine exactly 
what new elements were added to the Pauline vision by its 
thirteenth century resuscitators. It is a simple matter enough, 
of course, to compare the original Greek version with the late 
rehandlings, but we gain but little by doing so, since it in nowise 
assists us in discovering what features were picked up during the 
intervening centuries, and what were added from the scribes' 
own memories. 

The earliest Greek version of the vision is usually assigned to 
the fourth century, A. D. That it is no later we know from 
the historical notices of the work. It may be earlier; it un- 
doubtedly was modelled upon the Apocalypse of Peter. That it 
was a well-known book, even accepted by some as a genuine 
work of the apostle, is amply testified to by frequent references 
to it, and arguments concerning it, as late as the eleventh century. 
It is reasonable to suppose that it was, during this time, constantly 
receiving new features from other works ; for visions kept spring- 



The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell. 79 

ing up sporadically all through the centuries which preceded 
their flourishing period. Thus, though we possess but few literary 
evidences of the fact, the spark which burst into flame in the 
twelfth and thirteenth centuries had never really been extinct, but 
had simply been biding the time when the condition of men's 
minds should enable it to shine with the greatest lustre. And 
there can, I think, be but little doubt that the Vision of St. Paul 
existed by virtue of oral tradition, in much the same form in 
which we have it in the late manuscripts, many years before it 
was committed to writing ; and therefore it must be given 
priority to St. Patricks Purgatoryy for example, which resembles 
it so very closely in point of detail. 

Brandes has made a careful study of the relation of the English 
versions of the vision to the Latin and French, and I shall, 
therefore, pass on immediately to a consideration of the material 
which we find in the English versions, and which, of course, 
reflects the Latin texts. Most of the analogues to other works 
have already been pointed out as occasion required, so that the 
following is practically a mere summing up of the evidence. 

1. The burning trees occur in the Vision of Alberic (p. 43, 
above), and in several medieval oriental works (p. 14, above). 
I have been unable to trace them to their ultimate source. 
They seem to be original with the Pauline vision. As has been 
said (pages 35-36, above), they may possibly have existed in the 
Apocalypse of Peter, though lost to our fragment. They do not 
appear in the Greek version of Paul which we possess, but spring 
up in the earliest Latin texts. 

2. The burning caldron is a common feature throughout eastern 
and western accounts. Seven seems to have been a favorite, and 
in many cases an indefinite number. In Paul especially every- 
thing is reckoned by sevens : seven pains, seven flames, pit with 
seven seals, sinful soul driven by seven devils (compare with 
later seven deadly sins, seven cardinal virtues). In the Vision 
of Thespesius different crimes are denoted by diff'erent colors 
(p. 28, above. Compare also St. Patrick^ s Purgatory , sect. 11, 
below). 



80 The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell, 

3. The seven pains were, no doubt, originally designed as an 
index to all the torments of hell, but were later combined into 
a single mode of punishment. They are condensed to four in 
Tundale, sect. 7. Snow, ice, and fire are the customary paradox 
(above, p. 11 ; Brihthelm, p. 53 ; Aelfric, p. 68) ; blood is an echo 
of the Apocalypse of Peter (p. 38, above) ; whereas adders and 
stench are invariable attributes of all hells. East or West. 

4. The burning wheel is not so common a feature as one might 
expect. It occurs in St. PatricFs Purgatory, sect. 5, and in 
several of the more modern oriental accounts. 

5. The horrible flood is a feature of universal occurrence 
(see p. 37, above). We have it in just this form, with the serpents, 
and spanned by the bridge, in Tundale, sect. 8, and in St, Patrick's 
Purgatory, sect. 10. 

6. For recurrence of the bridge in vision-literature, see p. 17, 
above. For punishment of like with like, see p. 37. 

7. Immersion to various portions of the body is an outgrowth 
from Apocalypse of Peter, 11 (see p. 38, above). Assigning an 
appropriate punishment to every crime is a principle which is 
carefully observed in the Apocalypse of Peter, and in the earlier 
versions of Paul (see p. 36 f., above). 

8. This is borrowed from the Apocalypse of Peter, 14 (p. 39, 
above). 

9. For the significance of black clothing, see p. 32, above. 
The feature, in just this form, seems to be original with the Vision 
of St. Paul, Devils have iron horns in the Anglo-Saxon hell, 
SS., 941 f. (p. 61, above). 

10. The punishment of child-murderesses is emphasized in the 
Apocalypse of Peter (p. 38, above) and in the Vision of Alberic 
(p. 43). The Jesus Coll. version tells us that the souls before whom 
the meat was placed, but who could not touch it, were " sore of-thrust 
and ful hongri." Vernon leaves the nature of the punishment 
rather vague. We have here, of course, a reflection of the 
Tantalus myth. 

11. This is the famous pit of hell. Whoever enters here shall 
never receive grace — a striking fore-runner of Dante^s Losciate 
ogni speranza voi ch^entrate! We are, therefore, to distinguish 



rr- 



The Medieval Visiotis of Heaven and Hell. 81 

this feature from all the preceding ones, which together con- 
stitute purgatory. 

Little need be said of the additional features in the Jesus Coll. 
MS. In 1. we have the contrasted torments more clearly brought 
out than in Vernon. 2. reflects the original Greek and the Apoca- 
lypse of Peter more nearly. The stream of blood becomes, as we 
have seen, a stream of fire in most versions. Compare also Vision 
of Alberic, p. 44, above. 3. is elaborated still further in Tundale, 
sect. 10. 4. is a new feature peculiar to Paulj and, no doubt, 
a late medieval addition. 5. The iron wall is rather mysterious, 
iind is probably due to some error. 

2. The Vision of Tundale. 

Bibliographical Summary. 

Wagner, Visio Tnugdaliy Erlangen, 1882, in which he prints a 
Latin version of this vision on the basis of the seven oldest MSS., 
mentions fifty-four widely-distributed MSS. which contain the 
Latin text. These all belong between the twelfth and fifteenth 
centuries. Forty of them are in Germany and Austria, while 
England and Ireland have six between them. One or the other 
of them have been printed in, 1. Helinand of Froidmont^s 
Chronicle: Migne, Pat. Lat., ccxvii, 1038 f.; 2. Vincent of 
Beauvais' Speculum Historiale, Bk. xxvii, ch. 88 ; 3. Edmond 
Martene, Thesaurus Novus Anecdotorum, i, col. 490 (1717). The 
author calls himself "pater Marcus" in a prologue contained in 
six twelfth century MSS. His identity is doubtful (compare, 
for discussion. Ward, Catalogue of Romances, ii, p. 416 f.). In the 
fullest Latin texts the introduction of Marcus is followed by a 
fervid description of Ireland. 

An English metrical version, composed in octosyllabic rimed 
oouplets, is contained in the following MSS., all belonging to the 
fifteenth century: 

I. Edinburgh MS. Advocates Library, 19, 3, 1. 

II. Cotton MS. Caligula A II. 

III. Royal MS. 17. B xliii. 

IV. Ashmole MS., No. 1491 (Bodleian Library) : two fragments : 
6 



82 The Medieval Visio7is of Heaven and Hell. 

(a) 11. 2307-2326, upon which follow 11. 115-386. 
(6)11. 700-1165. 

There have been two editions : 

1843. W. B. Turnbull, The Vision of Tundale, etc. Prints 
III. Very rare. 

1893. A. Wagner, Das Mittelenglische Gedicht ueber die Vision 
des TundaluSy Halle. Prints composite text, based upon III. 

A small portion of II. was published by Wuelker, Altenglisches^ 
Lesehuch, ii, 1, p. 17 f. 

Wagner has made a laudable attempt to establish the inter- 
relationship of the English MSS., but has failed. For reviews of 
his work, see Anglia, Beiblatty iv, p. 129 (Holthausen), and Eng, 
Stud., XIX, p. 269 (Kaluza). 

The Vision of Tundale was, perhaps, the best known, as it is 
undoubtedly the most elaborate, of all the medieval visions.. 
In addition to the numerous Latin MSS., there is a large number 
of French, German, Italian, and even Icelandic ones. Ward 
describes one French version in the British Museum (Cott. Tiber.. 
Add'l 9771), which is a translation of the Latin text used by 
Vincent de Beauvais. He also mentions a Latin version copied 
by an Italian, with a short introduction in that language. Mussafia. 
prints one Italian version in Vol. xix of II Propugnatore. Compare 
also same author, "Sulla Visione di Tundalo," P/ii^. HisU Classe^ 
Vol. LXVii, p. 158. 

The Middle High German version was edited together with 
the composite Latin text by Wagner. The earliest work on the 
vision was done by Schade, Visio Tnugdali, Halle, 1869. For a 
Scandinavian version compare Unger, " Duggals Leizla/^ in HeiL 
Manna S^gur^ p. 329, Christiania, 1877. 

The date ascribed to the vision in its prologue is 1149. 

Synopsis of Contents. 

1. Tundale, a wealthy land-owner, falls into a trance while 
trying to exact payment from a tenant. 

2. When his soul leaves the body, it finds itself in a murk 
place, surrounded by a crowd of wicked demons with black bodies. 
Flames proceeded from their mouths ; they had great horns and 



The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell. 83 

pronged tails. Their nails were as hard as ground steel. They 
threaten and revile Tundale. 

3. A bright star appears in the distance, which proves to be 
Tundale's guardian angel. With him he proceeds on his journey. 

4. A dark valley, filled with foul stench, the ground strewn 
with glowing coals, over which is spread a sheet of iron, which 
the flames penetrate. Murderers are placed hereon, and are molten 
like wax. In this state they trickle through the iron, after which 
they again resume their shape, only to endure the same torment 
over again. 

5. Great mountain full of smoke and fire on one side ; ice, 
frost, snow, and wind, on the other. Thieves and robbers are 
tossed alternately from one to the other. 

6. Deep, dark abyss, from which proceeds a terrible stench. 
Here proud men and braggarts are punished. Tundale is led 
safely over the narrow bridge which spans it. 

7. A monstrous beast, in whose mouth 9,000 armed men might 
ride. This was Acharon, who swallows the souls of covetous 
men. Here Tundale experiences his first torment. He suffers 
from adders, fire, ice, stench. The tears of his eyes burn as fire. 

8. Terrible lake, full of horrible beasts; spanned by a narrow 
bridge, thickly strewn with sharp spikes. It is two miles long, 
but has scarcely the breadth of a hand. Those that fall from 
the bridge are at once devoured by the monsters in the lake. 
Thus are robbers punished. Tundale is required to lead a cow, 
which he had stolen, over the bridge. 

9. A house built like an oven, with stinking flames proceeding 
from it. Here fiends, armed with all kinds of weapons, cut off 
various portions of the bodies of gluttons. Sometimes they are 
chopped into little bits. Here a homily on the nature of pur- 
gatory is introduced. 

10. Frozen lake, in the centre of which is a great beast, with 
terrible black wings. His mouth is full of fire. Into it the 
souls of unrighteous men of religion are hurled, and when almost 
wasted away by the heat, they are plunged into the frozen lake. 
They are furthermore tormented by adders, which pierce their 
way outwards from every portion of the body. 



r 



,84 The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell. 

11. Through a dark, narrow way they come to a deep ravine 
full of smiths with great hammers in their hands. Souls are 
first raised to the right temperature in a fire fanned by great 
bellows. They are then hammered out on an anvil, after which 
they recover their original shapes, and are passed on to the next 
smiths, who tear them with hooks and tongs. Vulcan is the 
master of the smiths. 

12. Deep ditch, from which stinking flames shoot out. Burning 
pillar, which almost reaches heaven, rises from the pit. Up and 
down this pillar souls and devils are flying. When the souls 
are burned to ashes, they drop into the pit, where they recover, 
only to be burned again. 

13. Torture-chamber of Satan. Description of the arch-fiend. 
He is immensely "broad and thick.'' When he yawns he 
swallows a thousand souls at once. He is bound down in 
hard bonds. He has 1,000 hands, and 20 fingers on each. 
His tail is sharp and of great length. He lies on burning coals. 
He seizes souls in his hands and crushes them as one would 
crush grapes to get the juice; after which he drops them into 
the fire. Every time he sighs a thousand souls are exhaled. 
His own torments are, however, the most harrowing of all. 
Story of the fall of the angels, followed by another short homily. 
Tundale is led over a high wall into a place as light as day. 

14. Many souls suffering hunger and thirst. These have no 
positive crimes to pay for, but did no good. They will all 
be saved. 

15. Earthly Paradise: place full of fair flowers and sweet 
smells. In the midst of it is a well : fountain of youth, and 
immunity from hunger and thirst. 

16. House of gold, studded with precious stones. Within, a 
golden throne, upon which sat King Cormake (Cornale). Large 
crowds of bright-robed people bring him gifts and do him homage. 
But for three hours every day he must suffer torment, standing 
in fire up to his middle, because he broke his marriage vow. 

17. Passing a silver wall, they come upon many souls clad 
in white. These were the chaste and generous. 

18. A golden wall ; within, many thrones of gold and precious 
stones. Holy men, and martyrs for Christ. Automatic musical 



The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell, 85 

instruments make melody, and blessed souls sing in harmony 
with them. Sweet smells abound. 

19. Beautiful, very high tree, laden with all kinds of fruits, 
flowers, herbs, and spices, while many birds perch in its branches. 
Beneath it, many men and women live in golden cells, each with a 
crown on iiis or her head. The tree is holy church ; those beneath 
it, her supporters. 

20. A wall of precious stones. Within are the nine orders 
of angels, the Trinity, and God in His Majesty. Many saints 
are also here. 

After a sight of this, Tundale's soul returns to its body. 

Discussion. 

The Vision of Tundale is by far the most detailed and system- 
atically sustained of any which we possess. The author seems 
to have made it a point to gather together into an elaborate 
whole all the features of the entire remaining corpus of visions. 
There is hardly an incident in any other work which is not intro- 
duced, generally with numerous embellishments, into this epic 
of torment. The author's borrowings from the Greek and Latin 
are evident from the introduction of proper names, such as 
Acheron and Vulcan ; we have echoes of Irish history in the 
fate of King Cormake or Cornale. That he made use of several 
sources is evidenced by the two-fold introduction of the bridge 
(sects. 6, 8) — no doubt originally the same bridge in both cases. 
The cow which Tundale is forced to lead over the bridge is 
probably an original interpolation, as are the homilies in sections 
9 and 13. Especially noteworthy are the undoubted borrowings 
from the Vision of Thespesius. Sect. 10 reminds one most forcibly 
of Satan in the Inferno; in fact, there are several striking points 
of similarity between Tundale and both the Vision of Alberie 
and the Divina Commedia. The Vision of Tundale is further of 
distinctive interest, in that it differentiates hell (2-13) ; purgatory 
(14); a region corresponding to the earthly paradise (15); paradise 
(18-19); and heaven (20). The space devoted to purgatory is, 
to be sure, very small, but the statement that the souls " will all 
be saved'' unmistakably establishes its identity. The earthly 



86 The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell, 

paradise is the neutral place, without pain, but also without 
positive delights. 

Surveying now briefly the individual sections, we have in 
1. the customary vision concomitants, though detailed with con- 
siderably greater definiteness than in the majority of visions. 
In sect. 2 we have a more accurate description than we have 
yet met with of the outward appearance of the demons of hell. 
That they are black we already learned from the Apocalypse 
of Peter, 6. They are provided with horns in Paul (sect. 9). 
The Anglo-Saxon hell, we have seen (p. 61, above), was peopled 
with atol deor monig irenum hornum. We have a remarkable 
parallel to the nails, hard as ground steel, in Beowulf, 1. 984 f. : 

waes 
steda nsegla gehwylc style gelicost 
haejjenes handspora. . . . 

though the similarity is probably merely a coincidence. Sect. 3 
seems to be a borrowing from Di'ihthelm (p. 53, above) ; Tundale's 
guide also deserts him at critical moments, as in Bede's story 
(compare also Vision of Thespesius). Sect. 4 : The dark valley 
first appears in the Book of. Enoch , Lii, 1 (p. 24) ; but it is so 
indefinite and universal a feature that it is unnecessary to look 
for an ultimate source. To the iron floor, etc., we have 
already noted oriental parallels (p. 11). Sect. 5 seems directly 
borrowed from the Vision of Drihthelm. Sect. 6 is here out of 
place. The stinking pit is almost invariably reserved till the 
last (it is again introduced later on in Tundale), and it is never 
spanned by a bridge. Sect. 7 ; The poet is here somewhat 
mixed up in his classical terminology. We have frequently met 
with variations of the Cerberus myth in the visions ; also in 
the Anglo-Saxon hell (p. 62, above). The four torments seem to 
be a condensation of the seven in Paul (sect. 3). The burning 
eyes remind us of Aelfric (p. 68, above). Sect. 8 requires no special 
comment. The cow, as has been said, is probably original with 
Tundale. Sect. 9 : The house is possibly the " bath-house '^ of 
8L Patricks Purgatory (sect. 6). The process of cutting off 
various portions of the body we have already encountered in the 
Buddhist hells (p. 10), and in Dante. Sect. 10 recalls most 
forcibly Dante's frozen lake, with Satan in its centre. Indeed, 



The Medieval Visions of Heaven and HelL 87 

it is most probable that Dante made immediate use of both sects. 
9 and 10 of Tundale. Here again we have the torments of heat 
and cold alternating. Sect. 11 : The episode of the smiths is taken 
bodily from the Vision of Thespesius (p. 29, above). The fact of 
the souls recovering their original shapes after being mutilated 
was already noticed in the Buddhist hells (p. 11 f.). Sect. 12: 
This is evidently the mouth of hell ; see Vision of Alheric (p. 44, 
-above) ; St. Paul (sect. 11), etc. The burning pillar may have origi- 
nated with Enoch, xviii, 13, or xxi, 5 (p. 23, above) : ^* Columns of 
fire.'' Souls flying up and down in the flame recalls Thespesius^ 
Dante, Monk of Eynshani, Drihthelm, and Thurcill. Sect. 13 : 
We have here an extravagant description of Satan — no doubt 
the model for many subsequent ones. Satan is very commonly 
represented as lying on burning coals. The simile of the 
grapes is not original with Tundale. In and exhaling souls 
recurs in the Vision of AlberiCj and in Dante (compare p. 46). 
Sect. 15 : The earthly paradise contains the fountain of youth 
of the voyages, and of many romances. Compare for earthly 
paradise especially St. Patrick^ s Purgatoi^y, sect. 11, f. Sects. 
16 to 20 furnish a comparatively detailed description of the 
various abodes of the blessed, separated from one another by 
walls, the materials of which become ever more precious as the 
abodes which they partition become more blessed. The walls 
are an expansion of the crystal wall of Enoch, xiv, 10 (p. 22), 
and which recurs in the Vision of the Monk of Eynsham, sect. 8. 
In that vision, too, there is a similar division of the blessed into 
three parts (compare further p. 71 f, above). Sect. 19 : The tree 
is the tree of Enoch, xxiv, 3 (p. 24), and of many subsequent 
accounts. 

3. St. Patrick's Purgatory. 

Bibliographical Summary. 

The most exhaustive study of the MSS., etc., of this legend 
is by E. Koelbing, Englische Studien, i, pages 57-121. The most 
detailed Latin version is preserved in a large number of MSS. 
See, for those in the British Museum, Ward, Catalogue of Romances, 
II, p. 435 f. For discussion of authorship (" frater . . . . H. 



88 The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell, 

monachorum de saltereia minimus") and date, compare ihid.y. 
pages 436-444. Henry of Saltrey, according to Bale, flourished 
at the same time as Tundale, that is, about 1140. St. Patrick'' s 
Purgatory is mentioned, without any allusion to Sir Owen, by 
Jocelyn of Furness (1183: translated by E. L. Swift, Dublin^ 
1809). Also by Giraldus Cambrensis, Top, Hibern., Rolls Ser., 
pages 82-83. The full Latin version was printed by John 
Colgan, Trias Thaumaturga, ii, Lou vain, 1647. A second Latin 
version, considerably shorter than the first, and containing many 
variations in diction, etc., from it, is adduced by Matthew Paris, 
Chron. Major ^ Rolls Ser., Vol. ii, pages 192-203. Compare also 
ibid.j Vol. I, p. 223. The legend is also recounted by Jean de 
Vitry, Vincent de Beauvais, Messingham (Florileg, Ins. Sanet, 
Paris, 1624, Cap. Ill, X. Migne, Pair. Lat., CLXXX, p. 975 f.), 
and many others. Among French versions, that of Marie de 
France stands preeminent. Newly edited by T. A. Jenkins, 
L^espurgatoire seint Pairiz of Marie de France^ Philadelphia, 1894. 
There are three Middle-English versions of the legend con- 
tained in the following MSS. and editions : 

I. Last i XIII c. MSS. Ashmole 43 ; 

Egerton 1993; 

Laud 108; 

Cotton Jul. D. IX. 
Composed in septenaries. Published by Horstmann, Altenglische 
Legenden, Paderborn, 1875, pages 149-211. Also Horstmann, 
MS. Laud 108 : E. S. E. Leg. (E. E. T. 8., No. 87). 

II. XIII c. Contained only in Auchinlek MS. (Edinburgh). 
Composed in six-lined strophes. Published by TurnbuU and 
Laing, Owain Miles and other Inedited Fragments of Ancient 
English Poetry, Edinburgh, 1837. This volume is very rare. 
Newly edited from the manuscript by Koelbing, Eng. Stud., 
I, p. 98 f. 

III. XV c. Contained only in MS. Cott. Calig. A II. 
Composed in rimed couplets. Extracts in Wright, St. Patrick^ s 
Purgatory J p. 64 f. 

Entire work edited by Koelbing, Zoc. cit., p. 113 f. 
For Brome MS., see Eng. Stud., ix. 



The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell. 89 

Synopsis of Contents. 

1. Sir Owen finds himself in a dimly-lighted hall, surrounded 
by pillars and arches. He is met by fifteen men in white 
garments, who warn him that he will be attacked by fiends. 
These will try to frighten him back, and if they fail in that, 
will carry him away to their places of torment ; but he will 
escape if he never forgets God, and if he calls, in his utmost need, 
upon the name of Christ. Sir Owen is then left alone. 

2. Fiends rush up, taunt him, but promise to let him go back 
in safety. Sir Owen does not answer them. 

3. Sir Owen is thrown into a great fire. He invokes the 
name of Christ, and is released. He is then led through a dark 
region, where he can see nothing but the demons who lead him. 
A wind which he can scarcely hear yet penetrates his body with 
its sharpness. 

4. The four fields of torment : 

(a) Souls pinned down face foremost on the ground, with red- 
hot nails of iron piercing hands and feet. Demons beat them 
unmercifully. 

(6) Souls pinned down with their backs to the ground. Fiery 
dragons lacerate them with hot teeth. Toads of great size are 
on the breasts of some. These souls also are beaten with whips. 

(c) Souls pinned down with so many iron nails that not sufficient 
of their bodies is left uncovered with them for the admission of 
a finger-tip. These try to talk, but cannot. They are further 
tormented by a cold but burning wind. 

(d) Many fires in which souls are suspended : some by iron 
chains, by feet or hands, or hair or arms, etc. Some were im- 
mersed in sulphurous flames ; others were roasted on griddles, 
or turned on spits, or basted with molten metal. Demons con- 
stantly beat them. Here Sir Owen recognized some of his former 
friends. No tongue can tell the torments of these. 

5. Fiery wheel, surrounded by flames. Men were attached to 
it with iron spikes. One half of the wheel was in the air, the 
other dipped into the ground. 

6. Great house, immeasurably large, smoking horribly. This 
was a " bath-house.^^ It was full of divers molten metals, in 



90 The Medieval Visions of Heaven and HelL 

which souls were "bathed." Some were immersed to the eye- 
brows ; others, to the eyes, to the lips, to the neck, to the breast, 
to the navel, to the thighs, to the knees, to the calves. Some had 
only one foot in the bath ; others, only one hand, or both hands. 

7. Proceeding from the house, they go upon a high mountain. 
Looking down, Sir Owen perceives many shivering souls. As he 
is wondering at the sight, a violent wind suddenly arises from 
the North(-east), which drives all — demons. Sir Owen, and the 
souls — into a fetid and icy river. 

8. They go toward the South. Horrible pit, full of stinking 
flames, in which men are driven up and down, like sparks from 
a furnace. None who enter here, the demons tell Sir Owen, shall 
ever come out. He is hurled into it by the fiends. Upon calling 
upon Christ, he is spewed out by the flanae upon the brink of 
the pit. The demons tell him they had lied to him : the pit was 
not hell, but they would now lead him thither. 

9. Torrent of burning sulphur, very broad and fetid. Below 
this is hell. 

10. Over the torrent is a dizzy bridge, very high, thin and 
slippery. Sir Owen is forced to pass over it. He calls on 
Christ, and the bridge broadens at his every step, so that, when 
be reaches the other side, he is unable to see where it stops. 

11. Earthly Paradise, Sir Owen, after crossing the bridge, 
sees before him a high wall, beautifully adorned, and studded 
with precious stones. As he approaches, a door in the wall opens 
a little, and most wonderful perfumes are wafted to him. He here 
sees the various ecclesiastical orders. He is received into their 
company, and a bishop tells him that he (Owen) had passed 
through purgatory, as had all those present. Souls are clad in 
garments of different colors : some in gold, others in green, 
purple, blue, white, etc., according to the degree of virtue which 
they possess. This was the earthly paradise, from which Adam 
had been ejected for his disobedience. 

12. Sir Owen is led upon a high mountain, and sees the gate 
of heaven. Heavenly food descends upon him in the form of a 
flame. Sir Owen partakes of it, but is compelled to return 
to earth. 



The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell, 91 

Discussion. 

In St. Patrick's Purgatory we encounter at least one feature 
which we have not yet met with in tlie visions. Sir Owen visits 
purgatory in the flesh, as Ulysses and Aeneis and Orpheus did. 
We are not, however, to suppose that the original writer of the 
legend modelled himself upon classical antiquity in this par- 
ticular. The legend may, indeed, primarily have been stimu- 
lated by the cave of which it treats ; but, once the awe and 
curiosity of the people was aroused by it, the legend underwent 
a change of function, and became a stimulus for the cave, for 
such is undoubtedly the external history of this '' put in Irlonde." 
Having obtained a reputation as an entrance to purgatory, it was 
only to be expected that so important a place should be put into 
the keeping of the clergy. The clergy — possibly in all sincerity, 
for there is no reason to assume that Irish priests were less 
superstitious than Irish laymen — speedily spread reports of the 
wonderful character of the cave, shrouded it in a mantle of de- 
lightful mystery, and peopled it with definite horrors. But as 
the cave was a real thing, it would obviously not answer to have 
its horrors proclaimed through the medium of a vision seen by 
the soul only. This would be too incongruous a confusion of 
reality with unreality — of the actual world with the visionary. 
The public might — probably would — refuse to identify the vague 
abode visited by the soul of some visionary with their very 
material cave, and, therefore, we are given the unique figure of 
Sir Owen. 

As regards the purgatory itself, we have in it all the character- 
istic elements of a medieval vision. St. Patrick's Purgatory re- 
sembles the Vision of Tundale, in that Tundale also was made 
to undergo some of the torments of which he was witness. 
Furseus, too, it will be remembered, had his arm and shoulder 
burned. But, taking the work as a whole, it seems nearly certain 
that the writer took for his immediate model some version of the 
Vision of St. Paul, introducing a few additional features, especially 
from the Vision of Drihthelm, and the Vision of Tundale. This 
will appear from the following consideration of the individual 
sections. 



92 The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell. 

Sect. 1 : Whether there is any special significance to be attached 
to the fact that there are fifteen men, I have been unable to de- 
termine. In the romances the favorite number for a small com- 
pany is twelve — perhaps a reminiscence of the twelve apostles. 
The men are clad in the customary white garments, which at 
once lends them a supernatural character. This whole section is 
peculiar to St. Patricks Purgatory. To invoke the name of 
Christ when in great need was a common procedure, but we do 
not often meet with it in the visions. Sect. 3 : The great fire 
is a universal feature. The "dark region^' we are also familiar 
with. It appears in Enoch^ Tundale (sect. 4), Drihthelm (which 
may be the immediate source for St. Patriots Purgatory), Monk 
of JEynsham (sect. 5), and frequently elsewhere. The cold wind, 
too, we have met with in the Anglo-Saxon hell and elsewhere. 
Sect. 4 a recalls the sixth Buddhist hell (p. 21, above). Compare 
also Dante, Canto xxiii, the punishment of Caiaphas. 4 6, c, 
are merely variations upon 4 a, probably original with the author 
of St. Patricks Purgatory. The cold and burning wind (sect. 4 c) 
presents the familiar anomaly in a somewhat new form. 4 d pre- 
sents the very common features of suspension from, and immersion 
to, various portions of the body. For analogues, compare note 
on Apocalypse of Peter, 7 (p. 35, above). The immediate source for 
St. Patrick's Purgatory for this incident was, I am inclined to 
believe, the Vision of St. Paul. Roasting, basting, and turning 
on spits are possibly features of oriental origin. Thespesius 
(p. 27, above), recognizes his father; Dante meets many ac- 
quaintances. It is a common feature. — " No tongue can tell,'' 
etc., compare note on Apocalypse of Peter, 3 (p. 32, above). 
Sect. 5 : The fiery wheel seems undoubtedly to have been 
borrowed from Paul (sect. 4). Sect. 6 : The '^ bath-house ^' 
may, as has been said, be copied from Tundale (sect. 9). Different 
degrees of immersion we already met with in sect. 4 d, above. 
Sect. 7 : Ascension of mountains is a common procedure. Compare, 
for example, Apocalypse of Peter, 2 (p. 31, above); Furseus (p. 51, 
above), etc. Visions of heaven are very commonly had from such 
a point of vantage. In the Faust books, for instance, the Doctor 
ascends a mountain, and has a sight of the earthly paradise. — 
The wind from the north-east is probably from the Vision of 



The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell. 93 

Drihthelm. The icy river is possibly a borrowing from Tandale 
(sect. 10). — Sect. 8 presents a commixture of various features. 
The pit is undoubtedly the pit of hell, which we are familiar 
with through Paid and other visions. In St. Patrick's Purgatory 
the pit is, to be sure, made a part of purgatory, but only, as it 
would appear, upon second thought, since the devils are forced 
to acknowledge a falsehood in order to permit of the mention of 
the real hell under the river (sect. 9). With this exception, the 
pit is identical with the one in Paul (sect. 11). — Souls flit about 
in the flame similarly in Thespesius (p. 27, above), Drihthelm (p. 
53, above), Tundale (sect. 12), Monh of Eynsham (sect. 5), and else- 
where. — Sect. 9 is interesting chiefly from the peculiar position 
which is assigned to hell, being a remarkable echo of Enoch, Lxvi, 
6 (p. 24, above). Compare also note on Apocalypse of Peter, 6. 
Sect. 10 : In St. Patrick's Purgatory, the bridge is identical with 
the Mohammedan al Sirat (compare p. 18, above), not only in 
point of resemblance to detail, but also in position, in that it 
spans hell, linking purgatory with the earthly paradise, corre- 
sponding to earth and heaven, respectively, in the Mohammedan 
account. — For recurrence of the bridge of judgment in the 
visions, compare p. 18, above. St. Patrick's Purgatory has 
borrowed the feature from Paul. Sect. 11 : The account of the 
earthly paradise very closely resembles that which we find in the 

Vision of Alheric. The feature of the souls being clad in 
garments of various colors seems to have originated with the 

Vision of Thespesius (compare p. 28, above). 



4. Vision of the Monk of Eynsham (Evesham). 
Bibliographical Summary. 

There are seven manuscripts containing a Latin version of this 
vision. For those at the British Museum, see Ward, Catalogue 
of RoTtmnceSy ii, p. 493 f. For those at Oxford, see Sir Thomas 
Hardy's Catalogue of Materials for British History, Vol. i, pt. i, 
pages 78-79; 81. The Latin text has also been inserted in Roger 
of Wendover's Flowers of History, ed. Hewlett, Rolls Ser. i, pp. 
246-266 ; Roger of Wendover's Chronicle, Bohu's Antiquarian 



94 The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell, 

Library, ii, pp. 148-164; Matthew Paris' Chronica Major ^ Rolls 
Ser. II, p. 243 f. ; E-alph of Coggeshale, Ohron. Anglicanum, Rolls 
Ser., pp. 71-72. 

No English MSS. are known. English version by William 
Machlenia : "A mervelous revelacion .... to a monke of 
Euyshamme" (c. 1482); see Arber's Reprints, No. 18. The 
Latin text is closely followed. 

The vision purports to have been revealed by St. Nicholas to 
a monk, sometimes called Edmund, of the Abbey of Eynsham, 
in Oxfordshire, from the night before Good Friday to Easter 
eve, 1196. This is also the date under which we find it in 
Matthew Paris' chronicle. The author was Adam, sub-prior of 
the monastery, as we are told in the preface to the Vision of 
Thurcill? Adam became abbot of Eynsham in 1213, whence he 
was deposed in 1228. This Adam has recently ^ been shown to 
have been no other than the chaplain of St. Hugh of Lincoln, 
Adam, the author of the Magna Vita. The evidence for the 
identification seems sufficient, the author of the Vision of the Monk 
of Eynsham being expressly termed, in the preface to Thurcilly 
*^ chaplain to Hugh, Bishop of Lincoln.^ 



yj 



Synopsis of Contents, 

1. Falls into a trance, and remains in this condition for 
two days. 

2. The guide is an old man, clad in white (St. Nicholas). 

3. They go towards the East. 

4. They first see a horrible plain, marshy and filthy. There 
are here large numbers of souls, tormented according to the 
nature of their crimes (not specified), but all expressed the hope 
of salvation. First purgatory. 

5. A deep valley, hemmed in by a circle of rocks. In the 
centre was a lake, from which proceeded bubbles of fetid and 

' "And yet another vision has been clearly recorded which was seen in the 
monastery of Eynsham in the year 1196; and Adam, the sub-prior of the 
monastery, a most grave and religious man, wrote this narrative in an elegant 
style, even as he heard it from the mouth of him whose soul had been set free 
from the body for two days and nights," etc. 

^H. Thurston, The Life of St. Hugh of Lincoln, London, 1898, p. 348 f. 



The Medieval Visions of Heaven and HelL 96 

insupportable vapors. On the sides of the mountains burned 
terrible fires, the flames of which reached to heaven. Souls were 
plunged first into the lake, then into the fires, which hurled them 
into the air, like sparks from a furnace, and threw tliein upon 
the summit of the rocks, where they were beaten upon by snow, 
hail, and cold winds. Souls here were gathered together in troops, 
like to like. Second purgatory. 

6. Immense plain filled with sulphurous smoke and burning 
pitch, which, rising up like a mountain, filled this horrible place. 
Fearful reptiles covered the ground, and fed upon the miserable 
souls, who were further tormented by demons, running about like 
mad, who tore their flesh with burning pincers. 

7. Place in which perpetrators of crimes against nature are 
tormented in an appropriate manner. These will be judged on 
Doomsday, whether they are to be saved or consigned to eternal 
punishment, 

8. Abode of the blessed : vast plain, full of sweet smells and 
beautiful flowers. Three divisions : in the first, the souls were 
dressed in garments which, though not spotted or dirty, were only 
of a dull white; in the second, the souls had white and shining 
garments. The third division was heaven itself, separated from 
the second by a wall of crystal, of infinite extent, at the gate of 
which were crowds of souls waiting for admittance. 

Discussion. 

The Vision of Drihthelm has been followed more closely than 
any other single work in this vision. There are, however, many 
borrowings from other sources. 

In sects. 1 and 2 we have the customary conditions adduced 
under which most visions were revealed. St. Nicholas is a novelty, 
but he is " clad in white,'^ as the saints, and the blessed in general, 
always are (see note on Apocalypse of Peter , 3, p. 32, above). — 
Sect. 3 : In the Vision of Drihthelm, the direction taken was the 
north-east (compare p. 53, above ; also Enoch, xxvir, p. 42 ; 
Apocalypse of Peter, 3, p. 32). — Sect. 4 : The horrible plain, 
marshy and filthy, we have already frequently met with. Torment- 
ing according to the nature of the crime is a feature borrowed from 



96 The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell. 

the Vision of Paul (sect. 7), the Apocalypse of Peter (p. 36, above), 
and the oriental accounts. — Sect. 6 gives us the well-known lake. 
(Compare p. 37, above.) The valley with its encircling rocks, 
as well as the fires with their souls, are undoubtedly copied, 
directly or indirectly, from the Vision of Drihthelm (p. 53, above). 
The alternate torment of heat and cold which has been so often 
met with is here probably also ascribable to the Vision of 
Drihthelm. — Sect. 6 presents no new features. Tearing the flesh 
with pincers has a distinctly oriental flavor, though we find it in 
Tundale (sect. 11). — Sect. 8 : The souls in the abode of the 
blessed are divided into three groups — a division which has 
already been discussed elsewhere (p. 72 f., above). The souls are 
further distinguished by the relative brightness of their garments. 
The wall of crystal is from the Book of Enoch, xiv, 10 (p. 22, 
above), perhaps through Tundale (sects. 16 ; 20). 

5. The Vision of Thurcill. 

Bibliographical Summary. 

Ward, Catalogue of Romances, ii, p. 506 f., describes two Latin 
MSS. of this vision in the British Museum. The Latin text 
was printed in Roger of Wendover's Flowers of History, ed. 
Hewlett, Rolls Series, Vol. i, p. 497 f. Also in Roger of Wend- 
over's Chronicle, Bohn^s Library, ii, p. 221 f. ; Matthew Paris, 
Chronica Major, Rolls Series, Vol. ii, p. 497 f. 

There are no English MSS. of the vision. 

The vision was revealed in the year 1206 to a husbandman of 
Stisted, in Essex. Ward takes the author to be Ralph of Cogges- 
hale, and there seems to be no reason to doubt this, though Ralph 
never mentions the name of Thurcill in his Chronicle. But com- 
pare the Chronicon Anglicanum, Rolls Ser., ed. by Joseph Steven- 
son, pp. 72, 141, 162-3, 187. 

Synopsis of Contents. 

1. Thurcill, a husbandman of Essex, leaves his body and is 
conducted by St. Julian to purgatory. 

2. They go toward the East, and enter a large and glorious 
hall, supported by three pillars. To this souls go immediately 



The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell. 97 

upon leaving the body, and thence are sent either to purgatory 
or to hell. 

3. Fire of purgatory, between two walls. St. Nicholas is the 
overseer. 

4. A pond, very salt and cold : into this the souls wlio had 
passed through the fire are plunged for the purpose of cooling them. 

5. A great bridge, covered with nails and spikes, which leads 
to the mount of joy, where is a church large enough to contain 
all the people in the world. 

6. The hill of judgment (sect. 2). Sts. Michael, Peter, and 
Paul sit in judgment on the souls. Perfectly white souls are 
assigned to St. Michael, who sends them unharmed through the 
flames ; spotted souls are sent by Peter to purgatory ; whereas 
Paul and the devil sit one at each end of a large pair of scales, 
in which are weighed the black souls. If the scales turn to the 
saint, the soul is sent to purgatory; but if to the devil, it is 
hurled into a fiery pit just at PauFs feet. 

7. Devil comes riding up furiously on a black horse. The 
horse, Thurcill is told, is a transformed soul, who is tormented 
by being thus driven. It was the soul of a peer of England. 

8. The infernal theatre, in which fiends sit and enjoy a per- 
formance by the damned. 

(a) Proud man : struts about for some time clad in all the 
insignia of his proper sin. Suddenly the gay garments in which 
he is clad burst into flame, and he is thrust back to his place 
of punishment. Demons tear his flesh with burning pincers, 
and torture him with boiling pitch and oil. The '' smiths of 
Erebus" then approach him, and drive burning nails through 
various portions of his body. Being restored to his original 
shape, the punishment is renewed. 

(6) Hypocritical priest : his tongue is torn out by the roots. 

(c) Knight who had spent his life in slaughter and rapine. 
He is clad in armor, and rides a black horse, which vomits flames 
from mouth and nostrils. He is quickly unhorsed by the demons, 
who joust with him, after which he is tormented like his pre- 
decessors, and then thrust back into his place of punishment. 

[d) Lawyer who had died the year in which the vision is 
related. Thurcill recognizes him. He is forced to act over his 

7 



98 The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell. 

former deeds, pleading on one side, and accepting bribes on the 
other. He is then forced to swallow the fees thus received, 
and which have meanwhile been transformed into molten gold. 
A peculiarly infernal emetic is then administered, the gold is 
vomited forth, only to be re-swallowed ; and so on for a con- 
siderable length of time. 

(e) Adulterous man and woman. They perform and are tor- 
mented in a manner appropriate to their crime. 

(/) Backbiters, thieves, incendiaries, dishonest merchants — all 
of whom are tormented in similar ways. 

9. The pit of hell, with four caldrons. In the first caldron, 
souls are tormented in boiling oil and pitch ; in the second, in 
snow and ice ; in the third, in sulphur and fetid liquors ; in the 
fourth, in black, salt water. Every week the souls are changed 
from one caldron to another : those in the first, to the second, 
those in the third, to the fourth, and vice-versa. 

10. The "mount of joy." Souls here suiFer no pain, and 
await admittance to the abode of the blessed. They have been 
cleansed of their sins by the fires of purgatory. 

11. The Earthly Paradise. Immense temple, surrounded by a 
garden full of flowers, and fruits, and perfumes. The fountain 
of youth, and the tree of paradise. Under the latter lies Adam, clad 
in a vest of various colors, reaching from his breast to his feet. With 
one eye he laughs for the blessed ; with the other he weeps for 
the damned. When the number of the elect shall be complete, 
he will be entirely covered with his robe, and the world will be 
at an end. Its various colors denote the different virtues by 
which the righteous are saved. 

Thurcill then returns to his body. 

Discussion. 

It is impossible to fix upon any single work as the immediate 
model for this vision. Thespesius, St. Paul, Tundale, Monk of 
Eynsham, and St. Patricks Purgatory seem all to have contributed 
somewhat to its varied stock of torments. A number of new 
features, which we have not encountered in the works thus far 
treated, are given very especial prominence. These only need 
be considered in connection with this vision. 



The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell. 99 

Sects. 1, 3, 4, 5, present no new features. St. Nicholas as the 
overseer (sect. 3) of purgatory may be an echo of Monk of 
Eynsham (sect. 2). The pillars which support the hall of 
judgment are possibly from the Book of Enoch, xviii, 2 (p. 23, 
above). The hall itself, as well as the mode of judging the souls 
therein (sect. 6), is, as has been said, based directly or indirectly 
upon the Egyptian judgment (compare p. 26 f., above). The 
episode of the demon driving a soul (sect. 7) is analogous to a 
scene in the Vision of Alberic (compare p. 46, above, where 
other parallels are cited). The infernal theatre (sect. 8) we 
have not yet met with. It is of rare occurrence in works earlier 
than the Vision of Thurcill, but becomes rather common later. 
In the eighth (?) century Vision of Barontus, sinners are de- 
scribed as sitting around a great area, sorrowfully, in chairs of 
lead, each particular class of criminals grouped together. " There 
is a copy of this vision,'^ says Wright,^ '^ in a MS. of the twelfth 
century, in the British Museum, MS. Cotton Tiber. C. xi. 
There was another copy of this vision in MS. Cotton Otho A 
XIII, which perished in the fire. It was there said to have 
occurred in the sixth year of the reign of Theodoric, perhaps 
Theodoric IV, king of Austrasia and Burgundy, and in that 
case, A. D. 726.'' 

A closer parallel, pointed out by Ward, Catalogue of Romances, 
II, p. 570, is in the Vision of Gunthelm (compare Helinand's 
Chron.: Migne, Pat. Lat., ccxii, cols. 1060-1063), who, after 
leaving paradise, visits the furnaces of hell ; and he sees bishops 
there, and monks, and nuns, acting their former misdeeds for 
the gratification of the fiends. This may possibly have suggested, 
thinks Ward, the "Infernal Pageants," but the picture was 
probably a commonplace. For the '' Infernal Pageants," see 
Warton's History of Poetry, sect, xxvii, under the heading of 
Kalendar of Shepherdes. In the Vision of Gunthelm, too, Adam's 
robe is described in a manner very similar to Thurcill (sect. 11). 

The " smiths of Erebus " (sect. 8 a) are interesting reminiscences 
of Tundale (sect. 11), and Thespesius (p. 29, above). 

^ St Patrick? s Purgalory, etc., p. 105, note. 



100 The Medieval Visions of Heaven and Hell, 

Sect. 9 presents the familiar pit of hell. The four caldrons 
recall the burning caldron, with its seven flames, of the Vision 
of St. Paul (sect. 2). 

Various colors, denoting various virtues (sect. 11), is probably 
a variation upon the garments of different colors in St, PairicFs 
Purgatory (sect. 11). In fact, the whole description of the earthly 
paradise is very similar in these two works. 



LIFE. 

I was born in Baltimore, Md., July 9, 1875. Having received 
ray earliest education in the public schools of that city, I became, in 
1885, a student at the preparatory school of Dr. E. Deichmann. 
Thence, in the fall of 1891, I entered the Johns Hopkins University, 
and in June, 1894, received the degree of Bachelor of Arts from that 
institution. My advanced studies were pursued under the guidance 
of Professors Bright, Browne, Wood, and Learned ; Drs. Vos, Rambeau, 
Menger, and Marden. To all these I take this opportunity to express 
my sincere appreciation and gratitude ; to Professors Browne and 
Wood, in particular, I am indebted for many hints and inspirations 
which have proved of inestimable value. Above all, however, I wish 
to thank Professor Bright, to whose sound scholarship, untiring aid, 
and ready sympathy I owe far more than I can ever hope to repay. 



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